did not grow prettier as time went on. Even Annette, the sad
wife of the drunken Benoit, kept her fine looks; but then, Annette's
life was a thing for a book, and she had a beautiful child. You cannot
keep this from the face of a woman. Nor can you keep the other: when the
heart rusts the rust shows.

After a good many years, Armand de la Riviere came back in time to see
his father die. Then Julie picked out her smartest ribbons, capered at
the mirror, and dusted her face with oatmeal, because she thought that
he would ask her to meet him at the Bois Noir, as he had done long
ago. The days passed, and he did not come. When she saw Armand at the
funeral--a tall man with a dark beard and a grave face, not like the
Armand she had known, he seemed a great distance from her, though she
could almost have touched him once as he turned from the grave. She
would have liked to throw herself into his arms, and cry before them
all: "Mon Armand!" and go away with him to the House with the Tall
Porch. She did not care about Farette, the mumbling old man who hungered
for money, having ceased to hunger for anything else--even for Julie,
who laughed and shut her door in his face, and cowed him.

After the funeral Julie had a strange feeling. She had not much brains,
but she had some shrewdness, and she felt her romance askew. She stood
before the mirror, rubbing her face with oatmeal and frowning hard.
Presently a voice behind her said: "Madame Julie, shall I bring another
bag of meal?"

She turned quickly, and saw Parpon on a table in the corner, his legs
drawn up to his chin, his black eyes twinkling.

"Idiot!" she cried, and threw the meal at him. He had a very long, quick
arm. He caught the basin as it came, but the meal covered him. He
blew it from his beard, laughing softly, and twirled the basin on a
finger-point.

"Like that, there will need two bags!" he said.

"Imbecile!" she cried, standing angry in the centre of the room.

"Ho, ho, what a big word! See what it is to have the tongue of fashion!"

She looked helplessly round the room. "I will kill you!"

"Let us die together," answered Parpon; "we are both sad."

She snatched the poker from the fire, and ran at him. He caught her
wrists with his great hands, big enough for tall Medallion, and held
her.

"I said 'together,"' he chuckled; "not one before the other. We might
jump into the flume at the mill, or go over the dam at the Bois Noir;
or, there is Farette's