s?"

He stammered: "That's it! that's it! it's the fault of my disposition."

"How so, of your disposition?"

"Yes, when I become attached to a person I become attached to him,
that's all."

She began to laugh: "You are not going to try to tell me that
Maramballe's sweet disposition caused you to become attached to him for
life."

He was fidgeting about on his bench visibly embarrassed, and he muttered
behind his long beard:

"It was not he, it was you!"

The old lady, who had a sweet face, with a snowy line of curly white
hair between her forehead and her bonnet, turned around in her chair
and observed her servant with a surprised look, exclaiming: "I, my poor
Alexandre! How so?"

He began to look up in the air, then to one side, then toward the
distance, turning his head as do timid people when forced to admit
shameful secrets. At last he exclaimed, with the courage of a trooper
who is ordered to the line of fire: "You see, it's this way--the
first time I brought a letter to mademoiselle from the lieutenant,
mademoiselle gave me a franc and a smile, and that settled it."

Not understanding well, she questioned him "Explain yourself."

Then he cried out, like a malefactor who is admitting a fatal crime: "I
had a sentiment for madame! There!"

She answered nothing, stopped looking at him, hung her head, and
thought. She was good, full of justice, gentleness, reason, and
tenderness. In a second she saw the immense devotion of this poor
creature, who had given up everything in order to live beside her,
without saying anything. And she felt as if she could cry. Then, with a
sad but not angry expression, she said: "Let us return home."

He rose and began to push the wheeled chair.

As they approached the village they saw Captain Maramballe coming toward
them. As soon as he joined them he asked his wife, with a visible desire
of getting angry: "What have we for dinner?"

"Some chicken with flageolets."

He lost his temper: "Chicken! chicken! always chicken! By all that's
holy, I've had enough chicken! Have you no ideas in your head, that you
make me eat chicken every day?"

She answered, in a resigned tone: "But, my dear, you know that the
doctor has ordered it for you. It's the best thing for your stomach. If
your stomach were well, I could give you many things which I do not dare
set before you now."

Then, exasperated, he planted himself in front of Alexandre, exclaiming:
"Well, if my stomach is out