For the last three months she had been emptying Philippe's pockets especially, and now on days of passionate enjoyment he never came away but he left his purse behind him.

Soon she grew bolder and asked him for loans of two hundred francs, three hundred francs--never more than that--wherewith to pay the interest of bills or to stave off outrageous debts.

And Philippe, who in July had been appointed paymaster to his regiment, would bring the money the day after, apologizing at the same time for not being rich, seeing that good Mamma Hugon now treated her sons with singular financial severity.

At the close of three months these little oft-renewed loans mounted up to a sum of ten thousand francs.

The captain still laughed his hearty-sounding laugh, but he was growing visibly thinner, and sometimes he seemed absent-minded, and a shade of suffering would pass over his face.