“Alone! alone!” she replied, as if this were the only word she had heard. “Alone! Is she ever alone?”
And seeing that he was looking at her uncomprehendingly, she added—
“Enough of that! It is nothing but a fancy of mine that—— What is your news?”
Thereupon he went over the events of the famous day, the taking of the Bastille, the foundation of liberty.
Sophie listened to him gravely; then she said—
“It is our duty to rejoice, but our joy should be the austere joy which comes of sacrifice. Henceforth the French are their own men no longer; they are the servants of the Revolution which is about to reform the world.”
As she was speaking the child approached and threw himself joyously across her knees.
“Look, mamma! Look at my pretty garden!”
Embracing him, she said—
“You are right, little Emile, it is the wisest thing in the world to lay out a pretty garden.”