ther.

Christophe took the paper and went out as if to fetch his young
neighbor.

A few moments after his departure the goodman Lallier and his daughter
arrived, preceded by a servant-woman, bearing three bottles of old wine.

"Well, where is Christophe?" said old Lecamus.

"Christophe!" exclaimed Babette. "We have not seen him."

"Ha! ha! my son is a bold scamp! He tricks me as if I had no beard. My
dear crony, what think you he will turn out to be? We live in days when
the children have more sense than their fathers."

"Why, the quarter has long been saying he is in some mischief," said
Lallier.

"Excuse him on that point, crony," said the furrier. "Youth is foolish;
it runs after new things; but Babette will keep him quiet; she is newer
than Calvin."

Babette smiled; she loved Christophe, and was angry when anything was
said against him. She was one of those daughters of the old bourgeoisie
brought up under the eyes of a mother who never left her. Her bearing
was gentle and correct as her face; she always wore woollen stuffs of
gray, harmonious in tone; her chemisette, simply pleated, contrasted its
whiteness against the gown. Her cap of brown velvet was like an infant's
coif, but it was trimmed with a ruche and lappets of tanned gauze, that
is, of a tan color, which came down on each side of her face. Though
fair and white as a true blonde, she seemed to be shrewd and roguish,
all the while trying to hide her roguishness under the air and manner of
a well-trained girl. While the two servant-women went and came, laying
the cloth and placing the jugs, the great pewter dishes, and the knives
and forks, the jeweller and his daughter, the furrier and his wife, sat
before the tall chimney-piece draped with lambrequins of red serge and
black fringes, and were talking of trifles. Babette asked once or
twice where Christophe could be, and the father and mother of the young
Huguenot gave evasive answers; but when the two families were seated at
table, and the two servants had retired to the kitchen, Lecamus said to
his future daughter-in-law:--

"Christophe has gone to court."

"To Blois! Such a journey as that without bidding me good-bye!" she
said.

"The matter was pressing," said the old mother.

"Crony," said the furrier, resuming a suspended conversation. "We are
going to have troublous times in France. The Reformers are bestirring
themselves."

"If they triumph, it will only be after a long war, during