“Well! no,” murmured Clotilde. “I received such a shock! My first thought was to send Monsieur Mouret for my husband.”
Duveyrier gave her another glance. Now they understood each other. He slowly approached the bed, and examined Monsieur Vabre, stretched out in his corpse-like stiffness, and whose immovable face was streaked with yellow blotches. One o’clock struck. The doctor talked of withdrawing, for he had tried all the usual remedies, and could do nothing more. He would call again early on the morrow. At length, he was going off with Octave, when Madame Duveyrier called the latter back.
“We will wait till to-morrow,” said she, “you can send Berthe to me under some pretext; I will also get Valérie to come, and they shall break the news to my brothers. Ah! poor things, let them sleep in peace this night! There is quite enough with our having to watch in tears.”
And she and her husband remained alone with the old man, whose death rattle chilled the chamber.
CHAPTER XI.
When Octave went down on the morrow at eight o’clock, he was greatly surprised to find the entire house acquainted with the attack of the night before, and the desperate condition of the landlord. The house, however, was not concerned about the patient: it was solely interested in what he would leave behind him.
The Pichons were seated before some basins of chocolate in their little dining-room. Jules called Octave in.
“I say, what a fuss there will be if he dies like that! We shall see something funny. Do you know if he has made a will?”
The young man, without answering, asked them where they had heard the news. Marie had learnt it at the baker’s; moreover, it crept from story to story, and even to the end of the street by means of the servants. Then, after slapping Lilitte, who was soaking her fingers in her chocolate, the young woman observed in her turn:
“Ah! all that money! If he only thought of leaving us as many sous as there are five franc pieces. But there is no fear of that!”