'Everything is now settled,' resumed Madame Caroline; 'we are going up to the bathroom.'
It was the regulation that each inmate should take a bath on his arrival, and the baths were installed upstairs in little rooms adjoining the infirmary, beyond whose two small dormitories, one for boys and one for girls, the linen-room was situated. Six sisters of charity reigned in this superb linen-room, around which ran tiers of presses all of varnished maple, and also in the model infirmary, whose immaculate brightness, whiteness, and cheerful cleanliness were typical of health. And at times, too, some ladies of the Committee of Superintendence would come and spend an hour here in the afternoon, less to exercise any supervision than to help on the work by their own devoted assistance.
That day it chanced that the Countess de Beauvilliers and her daughter Alice were in a room separating the dormitories of the infirmary. The Countess often brought the girl there in order to divert her mind, in order that she might experience the pleasure which the practice of charity affords. And on this occasion Alice was helping one of the sisters to prepare some slices of bread and jam for two little convalescent girls who were allowed a snack between meals.
'Ah!' exclaimed the Countess at sight of Victor, who was given a seat whilst his bath was being got ready, 'here is a new one!'
As a rule, she behaved very ceremoniously towards Madame Caroline, merely saluting her with an inclination of the head, never speaking to her, for fear perhaps lest she might be obliged to enter into neighbourly intercourse with her. However, the sight of this boy whom Madame Caroline had brought to the Institute, the active kindness with which she attended to him, doubtless touched Madame de Beauvilliers and helped to draw her from her reserve. So they began talking together in an undertone.
'If you only knew, madame, from what a hell I have just taken him!' said Madame Caroline. 'I recommend him to your kindness as I have recommended him to all the ladies and gentlemen.'
'Has he any relatives? Do you know them?'
'No, his mother is dead. He has only me.'
'Poor boy! Ah! what misery there is!'
In the meantime Victor did not take his eyes off the slices of bread and jam. Ferocious greed had lighted up his eyes, and from the jam which was being spread on the bread with a knife his glances strayed first to Alice's tapering white hands, then to her slender neck, in turn to all parts of her figure—the spare figure of a sickly girl wasting away in the vain waiting for wedlock. Ah! if he had only been alone with her, how he would have given her a good butt in the stomach with his head and sent her reeling against the wall, so that he might have taken the bread and jam from her. However, the girl had noticed his gluttonous glances, and after consulting the sister of charity with her eyes, exclaimed: 'Are you hungry, my little friend?'