ill she need medicines?"

"Not much medicine, but a great deal of care," answered the doctor, who
could scarcely restrain a smile.

"Now, Monsieur Bergerin," said Grandet, "you are a man of honor, are
not you? I trust to you! Come and see my wife how and when you think
necessary. Save my good wife! I love her,--don't you see?--though I
never talk about it; I keep things to myself. I'm full of trouble.
Troubles began when my brother died; I have to spend enormous sums on
his affairs in Paris. Why, I'm paying through my nose; there's no end
to it. Adieu, monsieur! If you can save my wife, save her. I'll spare no
expense, not even if it costs me a hundred or two hundred francs."

In spite of Grandet's fervent wishes for the health of his wife, whose
death threatened more than death to him; in spite of the consideration
he now showed on all occasions for the least wish of his astonished wife
and daughter; in spite of the tender care which Eugenie lavished upon
her mother,--Madame Grandet rapidly approached her end. Every day she
grew weaker and wasted visibly, as women of her age when attacked
by serious illness are wont to do. She was fragile as the foliage in
autumn; the radiance of heaven shone through her as the sun strikes
athwart the withering leaves and gilds them. It was a death worthy of
her life,--a Christian death; and is not that sublime? In the month
of October, 1822, her virtues, her angelic patience, her love for her
daughter, seemed to find special expression; and then she passed away
without a murmur. Lamb without spot, she went to heaven, regretting
only the sweet companion of her cold and dreary life, for whom her last
glance seemed to prophesy a destiny of sorrows. She shrank from leaving
her ewe-lamb, white as herself, alone in the midst of a selfish world
that sought to strip her of her fleece and grasp her treasures.

"My child," she said as she expired, "there is no happiness except in
heaven; you will know it some day."

XII

On the morrow of this death Eugenie felt a new motive for attachment to
the house in which she was born, where she had suffered so much, where
her mother had just died. She could not see the window and the chair on
its castors without weeping. She thought she had mistaken the heart of
her old father when she found herself the object of his tenderest cares.
He came in the morning and gave her his arm to take her to breakfast;
he looked at her for hours together with