"Yes, yes," she said, the tears running down her face.
Troy was not sure if she recognized him, though his name had evidently called up some vague association. He saw that most things had grown far off to her, and that for the moment her whole mind was centred on the painful and humiliating effort of putting her case to this strange young woman who snapped out questions like a machine.
"Do you know her?" asked Miss Batchford, surprised.
"I used to, I believe," Troy answered.
"You can't think what she wants—just everything! They're all alike. She wants to borrow five hundred francs to furnish a flat for herself and her sister."
"Well, why not?"
"Why, we don't lend money, of course. It's against all our principles. We give work, or relief in kind—that's what I'm telling her."
"I see. Could I give it to her?"
"What—all that money? Certainly not. You don't know them!"
Troy shook hands and went out into the street to wait for Mme. Gantier; and when she came he told her who he was. She cried and shook a great deal, and he called a cab and drove her home to the poor lodging where she and her sister lived. The sister had become weak-minded, and the room was dirty and untidy, because, as Mme. Gantier explained, her lameness prevented her from keeping it clean, and they could not afford a charwoman. The pictures of the four dead sons hung on the wall, a wisp of crape above each, with all their ribbons and citations. But when Troy spoke of old M. Gantier and the daughter Mme. Gantier's face grew like a stone, and her sister began to whimper like an animal.