The doctor went up to the bed, examined the corpse, and declared to the amaze of the lookers-on that the death was due to cold and starvation. This redoubled Pitou's tears.
"Oh, poor aunt!" he wailed, "and I thought she was so rich. I am a villain for having left her to poverty. Oh, had I only known this! It can not be, Doctor Raynal!"
"Look into the hutch and see if there is any bread; in the wood-box and see if there is any fire-wood. I have always foretold that the old miser would end in this way."
Searching, they found not a crumb or a splinter.
"Oh, why did she not tell me this?" mourned Pitou. "I would have chopped up some wood for her and done some poaching to fill the larder. It is your fault, too," the poor fellow added, accusing the crowd; "you ought to have told me that she was in want."
"We did not tell you that she was in want," returned wiseacre Farolet, "for the plain reason that everybody believed that she was rolling in riches."
Dr. Raynal had thrown the sheet over the cold face, and proceeded to the door, when Pitou intercepted him.
"Are you going, doctor?"
"Why, what more do you expect me to do here?"
"Then she is undoubtedly dead? Dear me, to die of cold and hunger, too!"