For a moment Hyacinthe felt inclined to appropriate both the scrip and the agreement, but his courage failed him. Such a deed would have necessitated flight. Then, full of angry disappointment, he placed the papers under the lentils again, at the bottom of the pan. His exasperation was so great that he could not hold his tongue. The next day all Rognes knew of the agreement with old Saucisse, and the daily payment of fifteen sous for an acre and a quarter of poor land that was not certainly worth three thousand francs. In five years nearly fourteen hundred francs had been paid, and if the old rascal lived for another five years, he would be pretty certain to keep both the field and its value. Old Fouan was plentifully chaffed about his bargain, as was natural. Since he had divested himself of all his property, he had been unceremoniously passed by on the roads, but now he was again saluted and addressed deferentially since it was known that he had an invested income, and might possibly come in for some landed estate.
His own family seemed especially revolutionised by the discovery. Fanny, who had previously been on very cold terms with her father, annoyed at his having gone to live with his disreputable elder son instead of returning to her house, now brought him some linen—some old shirts of her husband's. She was actuated less by motives of self-interest than by an unconscious respect for the head of the family, who once more acquired some importance, as he was in the possession of property. Her father, however, was very hard and unbending, and he could not refrain from alluding to that cutting speech of hers as to his begging on his knees to be taken back again. He had never forgotten it; and, on receiving Fanny, he exclaimed: "So it is you, then, who are coming on your knees to get me back?" The young woman took this rebuff very badly, and when she got home again she wept with shame and anger. She was touchy to an extreme; a look sometimes sufficed to wound her; and honest, hard-working, and well-to-do though she was, she had fallen out with almost all the country-side. After that, Delhomme undertook to pay the old man's allowance, for Fanny swore that she would never speak a word to him again.
As for Buteau, he quite astonished everybody one day by making his appearance at the Château, coming, so he said, to pay a little visit to his father. Hyacinthe sniggered, brought out the brandy bottle, and they had a glass together. But his sneering surprise turned into absolute amazement when he saw his brother produce two five-franc pieces and lay them down on the table.
"We must settle accounts, father," said Buteau. "Here is the last quarter's allowance."
Ah! the scamp! he had never paid his father a copper for years past, and now to do this he must have designs upon him. He was no doubt offering him this money in the hope of getting him to return to his house. The truth is, that as Fouan reached out his hand to take up the coins, Buteau pushed it aside and hastily picked up the money himself.
"What I mean is, that I want you to know I have the cash all ready. I will take care of it, and you will know where to find it whenever you want it."
Hyacinthe began to scent mischief and grow annoyed.
"I say," he began, "if you want to get father away from me——"
"What! you're not jealous, are you?" Buteau laughingly replied. "Don't you think, now, that it would be more natural if father stayed a week with me, and then a week with you, and so on? Eh? suppose you cut yourself in two, dad! Well, here's your health in the meantime!"