d, who felt not the
slightest disposition to avail himself of the offers of the old
labourer, and grow up in goodness under the auspices of the venerable
cure. The inclinations of Bras Rouge's son were anything but rural,
neither did his turn of mind incline to the pastoral. Faithful to the
code of morality professed by the Chouette, and promulgated by her, he
would have been severely distressed to see the Schoolmaster emancipate
himself from their united tyranny; and he now thought it high time to
recall the brigand from the illusory visions of flowery meads and all
the _et coeteras_ of a country life, in which his fancy seemed
revelling, to the realities of his present position.

"Yes, oh, yes," repeated the Schoolmaster; "I will assuredly address my
prayers to your 'Lady of Ready Help.' She will pity me and kindly--"

Tortillard here interrupted him by a vigorous and artfully managed kick,
so well directed, that, as before, it took the direst effect on the most
sensitive spot. The intense agony for a time quite bereft the brigand of
speech or breath; but remembering the fatal consequences of giving way
to the feelings which boiled within him, he struggled for self-command,
and, after a pause of a few minutes, added, in a faint and suffering
voice, "Yes, I venture to hope your good mistress would pity and
befriend me."

"Dear father," said Tortillard, in a hypocritical tone, "you forget my
poor dear aunt, Madame la Chouette, who is so fond of you. Poor Aunty
Chouette, she would never part with you so easily, I know. Directly she
heard of your staying here, she would come along with M. Barbillon and
fetch you away--that she would, I know."

"Madame la Chouette and M. Barbillon. Why this honest man seems to have
relations among all the 'birds of the air and fishes of the sea,'"
uttered Jean Rene in a voice of mirthful irony, giving his neighbour
rather a vigorous poke with his elbow. "Funny, isn't it, Claudine?"

"Oh, you great unfeeling calf! How can you make a joke on these poor
creatures?" replied the tender-hearted dairy-maid, returning Jean Rene's
thrust with sufficient interest to compromise the safety of his ribs.

"Is Madame la Chouette a relation of yours?" inquired the old labourer
of the Schoolmaster.

"Yes, a distant one," answered the other, with a dull, dejected manner.

"And is she the person you were going to Louvres to try and find?" asked
Father Chatelain.

"She is," replied the blind man; "b