an--Monsieur Jean Roland--his sole
legatee."

They were all too much amazed to utter a single word. Mme. Roland was
the first to control her emotion and stammered out:

"Good heavens! Poor Leon--our poor friend! Dear me! Dear me! Dead!"

The tears started to her eyes, a woman's silent tears, drops of grief
from her very soul, which trickle down her cheeks and seem so very sad,
being so clear. But Roland was thinking less of the loss than of the
prospect announced. Still, he dared not at once inquire into the clauses
of the will and the amount of the fortune, so to work round to these
interesting facts he asked:

"And what did he die of, poor Marechal?"

Maitre Lecanu did not know in the least.

"All I know is," said he, "that dying without any direct heirs, he
has left the whole of his fortune--about twenty thousand francs a year
($3,840) in three per cents--to your second son, whom he has known from
his birth up, and judges worthy of the legacy. If M. Jean should refuse
the money, it is to go to the foundling hospitals."

Old Roland could not conceal his delight and exclaimed:

"Sacristi! It is the thought of a kind heart. And if I had had no heir I
would not have forgotten him; he was a true friend."

The lawyer smiled.

"I was very glad," he said, "to announce the event to you myself. It is
always a pleasure to be the bearer of good news."

It had not struck him that this good news was that of the death of a
friend, of Roland's best friend; and the old man himself had suddenly
forgotten the intimacy he had but just spoken of with so much
conviction.

Only Mme. Roland and her sons still looked mournful. She, indeed, was
still shedding a few tears, wiping her eyes with her handkerchief, which
she then pressed to her lips to smother her deep sobs.

The doctor murmured:

"He was a good fellow, very affectionate. He often invited us to dine
with him--my brother and me."

Jean, with wide-open, glittering eyes, laid his hand on his handsome
fair beard, a familiar gesture with him, and drew his fingers down it
to the tip of the last hairs, as if to pull it longer and thinner. Twice
his lips parted to utter some decent remark, but after long meditation
he could only say this:

"Yes, he was certainly fond of me. He would always embrace me when I
went to see him."

But his father's thoughts had set off at a gallop--galloping round this
inheritance to come; nay, already in hand; this money lurking behind th