e enough it was--for my son
shall not want while he has a mother, and that mother owns a stitch."

It was when it came to meeting clap-trap sentiment that trader's
inferior grain showed, and he faltered.

"I will go as far as a thousand. It is all it is worth."

By that word he exposed the small side of an otherwise worthy nature.
She sprang to the attack.

"_Diable!_ am I linked to a skinflint?"

"A skinflint, forsooth, at a thousand livres!"

"Yes," she cried in a fresh flood of tears. "A wretch, a miser. You are
unworthy, sir, to be linked to a family from whom Germain takes his
gentlemanly qualities. Had he nothing but you in him, he would be a
grovelling clod-hopper to-day instead of a favourite of kings."

Lecour laid down his wooden spoon in his pea-soup-bowl. He
phlegmatically took his clasp knife from its pouch, hung round his neck
by a string, struck his blade into the piece of cold pork upon the table
and cut off a large corner, in defiant silence. But his heart was heavy.
It was no pleasure to wrangle with so able a wife. He had no wish to
quarrel. Only, he knew the value of a livre. Germain was really becoming
a shocking expense. He felt that his wife would in the end persuade him
against his better judgment. In truth he liked to hear of his son's
successes, but it went against his prudence. There was to him something
out of joint in the son of a man of his condition attempting to figure
among the long-lined contemptuous elegants who had commanded him in the
army during his youth. The gulf, he felt, was not passable with security
nor credit.

Just as he was hacking off the piece of pork, a high-spirited black pony
dashed into the courtyard, attached to a calash driven by a very stout,
merry-eyed priest, who pulled up at the doorstep.

Lecour and Madame at once rose and hurried out to welcome him. At the
same time an Indian dwarf in Lecour's service moved up silently and took
the reins out of the Cure's hands. The latter came joyously in and sat
down.

"Oho," he cried, surveying the preparations on the table. "My good
Madame Lecour, I was right when I said an hour ago I knew where to stop
at noon in my parish of Repentigny."

"Father, I have something extra for you this time," she replied
laughing, and crossing to her cupboard, exhibited triumphantly a fine
cold roast duck.

"You shall have absolution without confession," he cried. "Let me
prepare for that with some of the magnificent pea-soup