gs, they are not to go into the kitchen. I can never come home
without finding them in the kitchen. It is exasperating. Let them have
their dinner at seven, and put them to bed at nine. And see that they go
to sleep."

The big girl with the equine head listened with an air of respectful
obedience, while her faint smile expressed the cunning of a Norman
peasant who had been five years in Paris already and was hardened to
service, and well knew what was done with children when the master and
mistress were absent.

"Madame," she said in a simple way, "Mademoiselle Lucie is poorly. She
has been sick again."

"What? sick again!" cried the father in a fury. "I am always hearing
of that! They are always being sick! And it always happens when we are
going out! It is very disagreeable, my dear; you might see to it; you
ought not to let our children have papier-mache stomachs!"

The mother made an angry gesture, as if to say that she could not
help it. As a matter of fact, the children were often poorly. They had
experienced every childish ailment, they were always catching cold
or getting feverish. And they preserved the mute, moody, and somewhat
anxious demeanor of children who are abandoned to the care of servants.

"Is it true you were poorly, my little Lucie?" asked Valentine, stooping
down to the child. "You aren't poorly now, are you? No, no, it's
nothing, nothing at all. Kiss me, my pet; bid papa good night very
prettily, so that he may not feel worried in leaving you."

She rose up, already tranquillized and gay again; and, noticing that
Mathieu was looking at her, she exclaimed:

"Ah! these little folks give one a deal of worry. But one loves them
dearly all the same, though, so far as there is happiness in life, it
would perhaps be better for them never to have been born. However, my
duty to the country is done. Each wife ought to have a boy and a girl as
I have."

Thereupon Mathieu, seeing that she was jesting, ventured to say with a
laugh:

"Well, that isn't the opinion of your medical man, Dr. Boutan. He
declares that to make the country prosperous every married couple ought
to have four children."

"Four children! He's mad!" cried Seguin. And again with the greatest
freedom of language he brought forward his pet theories. There was
a world of meaning in his wife's laughter while Celeste stood there
unmoved and the children listened without understanding. But at last
Santerre led the Seguins away. It wa