She inquired doubtingly: "Were you not saying that our poor friend Marechal had left his fortune to my little Jean ?" "Yes, madame." And she went on simply: "I am much pleased to hear it; it proves that he was attached to us." Roland had risen.
"And would you wish, my dear sir, that my son should at once sign his acceptance ?" "No--no, M.Roland.

To-morrow, at my office to-morrow, at two o'clock, if that suits you." "Yes, to be sure--yes, indeed.

I should think so." Then Mme.

Roland, who had also risen and who was smiling after her tears, went up to the lawyer, and laying her hand on the back of his chair while she looked at him with the pathetic eyes of a grateful mother, she said: "And now for that cup of tea, Monsieur Lecanu ?" "Now I will accept it with pleasure, madame." The maid, on being summoned, brought in first some dry biscuits in deep tin boxes, those crisp, insipid English cakes which seem to have been made for a parrot's beak, and soldered into metal cases for a voyage round the world.

Next she fetched some little gray linen doilies, folded square, those tea-napkins which in thrifty families never get washed.