"Yes, about two hundred and fifty. There's a good deal of wine, he tells me."
"I have always had wine in the cellar."
"The crémière," continued the concierge, without heeding her remark, "that's no great matter,—some seventy-five francs. It's for absinthe and brandy."
"She drank!" cried Mademoiselle de Varandeuil, everything made clear to her by those words.
The concierge did not seem to hear.
"You see, mademoiselle, knowing the Jupillons was the death of her,—the young man especially. It wasn't for herself that she did what she did. And the disappointment, you see. She took to drink. She hoped to marry him, I ought to say. She fitted up a room for him. When they get to buying furniture the money goes fast. She ruined herself,—think of it! It was no use for me to tell her not to throw herself away by drinking as she did. You don't suppose I was going to tell you, when she came in at six o'clock in the morning! It was the same with her child. Oh!" the concierge added, in reply to mademoiselle's gesture, "it was a lucky thing the little one died. Never mind, you can say she led a gay life—and a hard one. That's why I say the common ditch. If I was you—she's cost you enough, mademoiselle, all the time she's been living on you. And you can leave her where she is—with everybody else."
"Ah! that's how it is! that's what she was! She stole for men! she ran in debt! Ah! she did well to die, the hussy! And I must pay! A child!—think of that: the slut! Yes, indeed, she can rot where she will! You have done well, Monsieur Henri. Steal! She stole from me! In the ditch, parbleu! that's quite good enough for her! To think that I let her keep all my keys—I never kept any account. My God! That's what comes of confidence. Well! here we are—I'll pay—not on her account, but on my own. And I gave her my best pair of sheets to be buried in! Ah! if I'd known I'd have given you the kitchen dish-clout, mademoiselle how I am duped!"
And mademoiselle continued in this strain for some moments until the words choked one another in her throat and strangled her.