from the chimneys, that
one would have fancied that the man was burning all the drugs in the
world. "Don't you smell the poison?" said M. Rivals, indignantly. But
the young people passed the house in silence; they instinctively felt
that there were no kindly sentiments within those walls toward them,
and, in fact, feared that the fanatic Dr. Hirsch was sent there as
a spy. But what had they to fear, after all? Was not all intercourse
between D'Argenton and Charlotte's son forever ended? For three months
they had not met. Since Jack had been engaged to Cecile, and under-stood
the dignity and purity of love, he had hated D'Argenton, making him
responsible for the fault of his weak mother, whose chains were riveted
more closely by the violence and tyranny under which a nobler nature
would have revolted. Charlotte, who feared scenes and explanations, had
relinquished all hope of reconciliation between these two men. She never
mentioned her son to D'Argenton, and saw him only in secret.

She had even visited the machine-shop in a fiacre and closely veiled,
and Jack's fellow-workmen had seen him talking earnestly with a woman
elegant in appearance and still young. They circulated all sorts of
gossip in regard to the mysterious visitor, which finally reached Jack's
ears, who begged his mother not to expose herself to such remarks. They
then saw each other in the gardens, or in some of the churches; for,
like many other women of similar characteristics, she had become
_devote_ as she grew old, as much from an overflow of idle
sentimentality as from a passion for honors and ceremonies. In these
rare and brief interviews Charlotte talked all the time, as was her
habit, but with a worn, sad air. She said, however, that she was happy
and at peace, and that she had every confidence in M. d'Argenton's
brilliant future. But one day, as mother and son were leaving the
church-door, she said to him, with some embarrassment, "Jack, can you
let me have a little money for a few days? I have made some mistake in
my accounts, and have not money enough to carry me to the end of the
month, and I dare not ask D'Argenton for a penny."

He did not let her finish; he had just been paid off, and he placed the
whole amount in his mother's hand. Then, in the bright sunshine he saw
what the obscurity of the church had concealed: traces of tears and a
look of despair on the face that was generally so smiling and fresh.
Intense compassion filled his hea