to Claude de
Buxieres. I refused, and forbade the notary to open his mouth on the
subject. What! should I play the part of a craven hound before this
younger son whom my father detested, and beg for a portion of the
inheritance? Thank you! I prefer to take myself out of the way at once!"

"You prefer to have your mother beg her bread at strangers' doors!"
replied Manette, bitterly, shedding tears of rage.

"I have already told you, mother, that when one has a good pair of arms,
and the inclination to use them, one has no need to beg one's bread.
Enough said! I am going to Auberive to notify the justice and the
notary."

While Claudet was striding across the woods, the boy carried the luggage
of the newly arrived traveller into the chamber on the first floor, and
Zelie, the small servant, put the sheets on the bed, dusted the room, and
lighted the fire. In a few minutes, Julien was alone in his new domicile,
and began to open his boxes and valises. The chimney, which had not been
used since the preceding winter, smoked unpleasantly, and the damp logs
only blackened instead of burning. The boxes lay wide open, and the room
of the deceased Claude de Buxieres had the uncomfortable aspect of a
place long uninhabited. Julien had seated himself in one of the large
armchairs, covered in Utrecht velvet, and endeavored to rekindle the
dying fire. He felt at loose ends and discouraged, and had no longer the
courage to arrange his clothes in the open wardrobes, which stood open,
emitting a strong odor of decaying mold.

The slight breath of joyous and renewed life which had animated him on
leaving the Vincart farm, had suddenly evaporated. His anticipations
collapsed in the face of these bristling realities, among which he felt
his isolation more deeply than ever before. He recalled the cordiality of
Reine's reception, and how she had spoken of the difficulties he should
have to encounter. How little he had thought that her forebodings would
come true the very same day! The recollection of the cheerful and
hospitable interior of La Thuiliere contrasted painfully with his cold,
bare Vivey mansion, tenanted solely by hostile domestics. Who were these
people--this Manette Sejournant with her treacherous smile, and this
fellow Claudet, who had, at the very first, subjected him to such
offensive questioning? Why did they seem so ill-disposed toward him? He
felt as if he were completely enveloped in an atmosphere of contradiction
an