Mme. la Marquise roused herself from her meditations. There had been silence between her and her brother for some time, while her mind took this sudden incursion into the past; but at the further end of the room Fernande de Courson and Laurent de Mortain were whispering and laughing together. Madame turned and looked over her shoulder at the two young people; then she said abruptly and with seeming irrelevance to her brother:
"Fernande is getting too old for all that childishness."
"Childishness, my dear," said the Comte, somewhat bewildered at this sudden change in his sister's train of thought. "I don't understand...."
"You can't wish her to become the butt of all the gossips in the village ... which she will do if you allow this childish philandering to go on."
"You mean Laurent?" he queried blankly.
"Why—of course. Fernande is seventeen—Laurent has not a sou to bless himself with...."
"For the moment," interposed the Comte. "When King Louis comes into his own again, Laurent will retake possession of his heritage...."
Madame la Marquise shook her head impatiently.
"Confiscated lands will never be restored," she said firmly, "not even by King Louis. The process would be too dangerous; it would kindle a fresh revolution. Those of us whose lands have been sold by that execrable Revolutionary government will remain poor and dispossessed to the end of our days."