"Oh! my good little angel from Paradise," cried Mont Saint Jean, falling at the feet of La Goualeuse, and trying to take her hand to kiss it. "What is it I have done that you should be so charitable toward me, and all these ladies also? Is it possible, my good angel? For my child—everything that I want! Who could have believed it? I shall go off my head, I am sure. Why, I was just now the scapegoat of every one! In a moment, because you said something in your dear little voice of a seraph, you turn them from evil to good; and now they love me, and I love them. They are so good! I was wrong to get angry. Wasn't I a fool, and unjust, and ungrateful? All they have done to me was only for a laugh; they didn't wish me any harm—it was for my good; for here is the proof. Why, now, if they were to kill me on the spot, I would not say a word."
"We have eighty-four francs and seven sous," said La Louve, having finished counting the money she had collected. "Who will be treasurer? Mustn't give it to Mont Saint Jean; she is too stupid."
"Let Goualeuse take charge of the money," they all cried unanimously.
"If you listen to me," said Fleur-de-Marie, "you will beg Madame Armand, the inspectress, to take charge of this sum, and make the necessary purchases; and then she will know the good action you have done, and, perhaps, will ask to have your time reduced. Well, La Louve," added she, taking her companion by the arm, "don't you now feel happier than when you were casting to the winds, just now, the poor rags of Mont Saint Jean?"
La Louve at first did not answer. To the generous warmth which had for a moment animated her features had succeeded a kind of savage defiance.
Fleur-de-Marie looked at her with surprise, not understanding this sudden change.
"La Goualeuse, come; I want to talk to you," said La Louve, in a sullen manner; and leaving the other prisoners, she led Fleur-de-Marie near to the basin which was in the center of the court. La Louve and her companion seated themselves, isolated from the rest of their companions.
The winter's sun shed its pale rays upon them, the blue sky was partially obscured by white and fleecy clouds; some birds, deceived by the mildness of the atmosphere, were warbling in the black branches of the large chestnut-trees in the court; two or three sparrows, bolder than the rest, came to drink and to bathe in a little brook which flowed from the fountain; the stone margin was covered with green moss, and here and there from the interstices rose some tufts of green herbs, which the frost had spared. This description of the prison basin may seem trifling, but Fleur-de-Marie lost not one of these details; with her eyes fixed sadly on the clouds as they broke the azure of the sky, or reflected the golden rays of the sun, she thought, with a sigh, of the magnificence of nature, which she much loved, admired poetically, and of which she was deprived.
"What do you wish to say to me?" asked La Goualeuse of her companion, who, seated alongside of her, remained somber and silent.
"It is necessary that we have a settlement," cried La Louve, harshly, "this can't go on."