At last dawn came, the good woman rose, her heart still terribly oppressed. Germaine calmed her as best she could with reassuring words and also with a foaming bowl of hot coffee.
All morning Mother Etienne endured torments.
It was three o'clock in the afternoon when suddenly the sound of a heavy carriage drawn by four horses was heard in the courtyard. Labric barked with all his might, Coco whinnied loudly, the three cows all mooed at the same time, and the entire poultry-yard in an uproar added its piercing 56 and varied tones to the general tumult. The pigs especially made a great noise.
It was the American's four-in-hand.
He was driving himself, and on his left sat a young and pretty woman, exquisitely dressed in white.
The newcomers were at once shown into the huge kitchen, which served also as a reception room. On the hearth burned a small bundle of scented herbs which filled the whole room with fragrance. Yollande was sitting in her usual place.
"Well, Madame, have you at last decided to let me have the curly-haired hen?"
Mother Etienne neither moved nor answered.
"See here, Madame, I offer you $4,000, $6,000, $8,000," and so saying he took from a red morocco pocketbook in banknotes the sums he mentioned, and spread them out on the table before the astonished eyes of Mother Etienne and Germaine.