“I thank you for having come to me, dear mother. Only one thing was lacking to complete my happiness, and that was your presence. Now take care! I shall never allow you to leave me.”
“Leave you! No, Jack; we will always live together—we two. You know I told you that the day would come when I should need you. It has come now.”
Under her son’s caresses she became tranquillized. There came an occasional sob, like a child who has wept for a long time.
“You see,” she said, “how happy we may be. I owe you much care and tenderness. I feel now that I can breathe freely. Your room is bare and small, but it seems to me like Paradise itself.”
This brief summary of the apartment regarded by Bélisaire as so magnificent, disturbed Jack somewhat as to the future; but he had no time now for discussions; he had but half an hour before he must leave, and he must decide at once on something definite. He must consult Bélisaire, whom he heard patiently pacing the corridor, and who would have waited until nightfall without once knocking to see if the interview was over.
“Bélisaire, my mother has come to live with me; how shall we manage?”
Bélisaire started as he thought, “And now the marriage must be postponed, for Jack will not be one of our little ménage!”
But he concealed his disappointment, and exerted himself to suggest some plan that would relieve his friend of present embarrassment. It was decided finally that he should relinquish the room to Jack and his mother and find for himself a closet to sleep in, depositing his stock of hats and his furniture with Madame Weber.
Jack presented his friend to Bélisaire, who remembered very well the fair lady at Aulnettes, and at once placed himself for the day at the service of Ida de Barancy; for “Charlotte” was no more heard of. A bed must be purchased, a couple of chairs, and a dressing-bureau. Jack took from the drawer where he kept his savings three or four gold pieces which he gave his mother.
“You know,” he said, “that if marketing is disagreeable to you, good Madame Weber will attend to the dinners.”