d said, with his
malicious laugh:

"Charles is not here; he is at the asylum with the old woman."

Then, taking Maxime to the end of the terrace, he pointed out to him the
great white buildings, whose inner gardens resembled prison yards.

"Look, nephew, you see those three trees in front of you? Well, beyond
the one to the left, there is a fountain in a court. Follow the ground
floor, and the fifth window to the right is Aunt Dide's. And that is
where the boy is. Yes, I took him there a little while ago."

This was an indulgence of the directors. In the twenty years that she
had been in the asylum the old woman had not given a moment's uneasiness
to her keeper. Very quiet, very gentle, she passed the days motionless
in her easy-chair, looking straight before her; and as the boy liked to
be with her, and as she herself seemed to take an interest in him,
they shut their eyes to this infraction of the rules and left him there
sometimes for two or three hours at a time, busily occupied in cutting
out pictures.

But this new disappointment put the finishing stroke to Felicite's
ill-humor; she grew angry when Macquart proposed that all five should go
in a body in search of the boy.

"What an idea! Go you alone, and come back quickly. We have no time to
lose."

Her suppressed rage seemed to amuse Uncle Macquart, and perceiving how
disagreeable his proposition was to her, he insisted, with his sneering
laugh:

"But, my children, we should at the same time have an opportunity of
seeing the old mother; the mother of us all. There is no use in talking;
you know that we are all descended from her, and it would hardly be
polite not to go wish her a good-day, when my grandnephew, who has come
from such a distance, has perhaps never before had a good look at her.
I'll not disown her, may the devil take me if I do. To be sure she is
mad, but all the same, old mothers who have passed their hundredth year
are not often to be seen, and she well deserves that we should show
ourselves a little kind to her."

There was silence for a moment. A little shiver had run through every
one. And it was Clotilde, silent until now, who first declared in a
voice full of feeling:

"You are right, uncle; we will all go."

Felicite herself was obliged to consent. They re-entered the landau,
Macquart taking the seat beside the coachman. A feeling of disquietude
had given a sallow look to Maxime's worn face; and during the short
drive he ques