"You have been my wife's maid," said the Advocate to Dionetta, as she was about to pass him. Dionetta curtsied. "Has she discharged you?"
Dionetta cast a nervous glance at Pierre Lamont, and another at Mother Denise. The old grandmother answered for her.
"I thought it as well," said Mother Denise, "in all respect and humility, that so simple a child as Dionetta should be kept to her simple life. My lady was good enough to give Dionetta a pair of diamond earrings and a diamond finger-ring, which we have left behind us." Fritz made a grimace. "These things are not fit for poor peasants, and the pleasure they convey is a dangerous pleasure."
"You are not favourably disposed towards my wife," said the Advocate. Mother Denise was silent. "But you are right in what you say. Diamonds are not fit gifts for simple maids. I wish you well, you and your grandchild. It might have been----" The thought of his own child, of the same age as Dionetta, and as beautiful, crossed his mind. He brushed his hand across his eyes, and when he looked round the room again, he and Pierre Lamont were alone.
"A fool of fools," said Pierre Lamont, looking after Fritz. "If he and the pretty Dionetta wed--it will be a suitable match for beauty to mate with folly--he will be father to a family of fools who may, in their way, be wiser in their generation than you and I. Your decision is irrevocable?"
"It is irrevocable."
"If you do not find your wife you will endeavour to return to us?"
"I shall find her."
"And then?" asked Pierre Lamont with a singular puckering of his brows.
"And then?" echoed the Advocate absently, and added: "Who can tell what may happen from one hour to another?"