"Ah!" she sighed. Her brows wrinkled up a little, and there was a touch of scorn in the pretty lines of her mouth. "Ah! Ange and I will never reach your philosopher's level," she said.
"I wish—I wish—" Monsieur Urbain muttered, pacing up and down, "that Joseph would grow a little wiser as he grows older. The Prefect is excellent—if it were only the Prefect—but the fellows who were with him—yes, it would be disagreeable to feel that there was a string round Joseph's neck and that the police held the end of it. A secret meeting to-day—at Joseph's house—and Joseph's and Angelot's the only names known!"
"Ange was not at the meeting!" cried Madame de la Marinière.
"I know—but who will believe that?"
Angelot was a little impressed. He had very seldom seen his father, so hopeful, so even-tempered, with a cloud of anxiety on his face. The very rarity of such uneasiness made it catching. A sort of apprehensive chill seemed to creep from the corners of the dark old room, steal along by the shuttered windows, hover about the gaping cavern of the hearth. It became an air, breathing through the room in the motionless September night, so that the candle-flames on madame's table bent and flickered suddenly.
Then the dogs out in the yard began to bark.
"They are barking at the moon," said Monsieur Urbain. "No, at somebody passing by."
"Somebody is coming in, father," said Angelot, "I hear footsteps in the court—they are on the steps—in the porch. Shall I see who it is?"
The mother turned pale, half rose, as if to stop him. "Not the police!" were the words on her lips; but her husband's calmness reassured her.