upon you! What pains she would take to try and
divert you from thinking of what you suffered! And how tenderly she
looked after her little brothers and sisters, finding time for
everything! Ah, with our Louise all our joy and happiness--all--all--left
us!"

"Don't go on so, Morel. Don't remind me of all these things, or you will
break my heart," cried Madeleine, weeping bitterly.

"And, then, when I think that perhaps that old monster--Do you know,
when that idea flashes across my brain, my senses seem disturbed, and I
have but one thought, that of first killing him and then killing
myself?"

"What would become of all of us if you were to do so? Besides, I tell
you again, you make things worse than they really are. I dare say the
notary was only joking with Louise. He is such a pious man, and goes so
regularly to mass every Sunday, and only keeps company with priests
folks say. Why, many people think that he is safer to place money with
than the bank itself."

"Well, and what does all that prove? Merely that he is a rich hypocrite,
instead of a poor one. I know well enough what a good girl Louise is;
but then she loves us so tenderly that it breaks her heart to see the
want and wretchedness we are in. She knows well enough that if anything
were to happen to me you would all perish with hunger; and by
threatening to put me into prison he might work on the dear child's
mind,--like a villain as he is,--and persuade her, on our account! O,
God, my brain burns! I feel as though I were going mad."

"But, Morel, if ever that were the case, the notary would be sure to
make her a great number of fine presents or money, and, I am sure, she
would not have kept them all to herself. She would certainly have
brought part to us."

"Silence, woman! Let me hear no more such words escape your lips. Louise
touch the wages of infamy! My good, my virtuous girl, accept such foul
gifts! Oh, wife!"

"Not for herself, certainly. But to bring to us perhaps she would--"

"Madeleine," exclaimed Morel, excited almost to frenzy, "again, I say,
let me not hear such language from your lips; you make me shudder.
Heaven only knows what you and the children also would become were I
taken away, if such are your principles."

"Why, what harm did I say?"

"Oh, none."

"Then what makes you uneasy about Louise?"

The lapidary impatiently interrupted his wife by saying:

"Because I have noticed for the last three months that, whenever Louise