rested in the child, who likewise felt frightened and
turned pale on seeing the grief of his two mammas.

"So that lad is my brother?"

Thereupon Norine suddenly sprang to her feet and set herself between
the child and him. A mad fear had come to her of some catastrophe, some
great collapse which would crush them all. Yet she did not wish to be
harsh, she even sought kind words, but amid it all she lost her head,
carried away by feelings of revolt, rancor, instinctive hostility.

"You came, I can understand it. But it is so cruel. What can I do? After
so many years one doesn't know one another, one has nothing to say. And,
besides, as you can see for yourself, I'm not rich."

Alexandre glanced round the room for the second time. "Yes, I see," he
answered; "and my father, can't you tell me his name?"

She remained thunderstruck by this question and turned yet paler, while
he continued: "Because if my father should have any money I should know
very well how to make him give me some. People have no right to fling
children into the gutter like that."

All at once Norine had seen the past rise up before her: Beauchene,
the works, and her father, who now had just quitted them owing to his
infirmities, leaving his son Victor behind him.

And a sort of instinctive prudence came to her at the thought that if
she were to give up Beauchene's name she might compromise all her happy
life, since terrible complications might ensue. The dread she felt of
that suspicious-looking lad, who reeked of idleness and vice, inspired
her with an idea: "Your father? He has long been dead," said she.

He could have known nothing, have learnt nothing on that point, for, in
presence of the energy of her answer, he expressed no doubt whatever of
her veracity, but contented himself with making a rough gesture which
indicated how angry he felt at seeing his hungry hopes thus destroyed.

"So I've got to starve!" he growled.

Norine, utterly distracted, was possessed by one painful desire--a
desire that he might take himself away, and cease torturing her by his
presence, to such a degree did remorse, and pity, and fright, and horror
now wring her bleeding heart. She opened a drawer and took from it a
ten-franc piece, her savings for the last three months, with which she
had intended to buy a New Year's present for her little boy. And giving
those ten francs to Alexandre, she said: "Listen, I can do nothing for
you. We live all three in this one