e--"

"Well, what is it?"

"You are quite sure that you do not want to sell your land?"

"Certainly not; you may make up your mind to that. What I have said I
have said, so don't refer to it again."

"Very well; only I think I know of an arrangement that might suit us
both very well."

"What is it?"

"Just this. You shall sell it to me and keep it all the same. You don't
understand? Very well, then follow me in what I am going to say."

The old woman left off peeling potatoes and looked at the innkeeper
attentively from under her heavy eyebrows, and he went on:

"Let me explain myself. Every month I will give you a hundred and fifty
francs. You understand me! suppose! Every month I will come and bring
you thirty crowns, and it will not make the slightest difference in your
life--not the very slightest. You will have your own home just as you
have now, need not trouble yourself about me, and will owe me nothing;
all you will have to do will be to take my money. Will that arrangement
suit you?"

He looked at her good-humoredly, one might almost have said
benevolently, and the old woman returned his looks distrustfully, as if
she suspected a trap, and said:

"It seems all right as far as I am concerned, but it will not give you
the farm."

"Never mind about that," he said; "you may remain here as long as it
pleases God Almighty to let you live; it will be your home. Only you
will sign a deed before a lawyer making it over to me; after your death.
You have no children, only nephews and nieces for whom you don't care
a straw. Will that suit you? You will keep everything during your life,
and I will give you the thirty crowns a month. It is pure gain as far as
you are concerned."

The old woman was surprised, rather uneasy, but, nevertheless, very much
tempted to agree, and answered:

"I don't say that I will not agree to it, but I must think about it.
Come back in a week, and we will talk it over again, and I will then
give you my definite answer."

And Chicot went off as happy as a king who had conquered an empire.

Mother Magloire was thoughtful, and did not sleep at all that night; in
fact, for four days she was in a fever of hesitation. She suspected that
there was something underneath the offer which was not to her advantage;
but then the thought of thirty crowns a month, of all those coins
clinking in her apron, falling to her, as it were, from the skies,
without her doing anything for it, aroused h