"Allons! Allons! my good ladies!" croaked the auctioneer. "Forty sous for the lot. A bed quilt for a princess and a magnificent water filter de luxe that will keep your children well out of the doctor's hands. Allons! forty sous, forty-one—two?"
A merchant in hogs raised his red, puffy hand, then turned away with a leer as the shrill voice of a fisher woman cried, "Forty-five."
"Sold!" yelped the auctioneer—"sold to madame the widow Dupuis of Hirondelette," who was now elbowing her broad way through the crowd to her bargain which she struggled out with, red and perspiring, to the mud-smeared lawn, where her eldest daughter shrewdly examined the bedquilt for holes.
I turned away when it was all over and followed the crowd out through the gates. Le Gros was climbing into his cart. He was drunk and swearing over the poor result of the sale. De Savignac was still in his debt—and I continued on my way home, feeling as if I had attended an execution.
Half an hour later the sharp bark of my yellow puppy greeted me from beyond my wall. As I entered my courtyard, he came to me wriggling with joy. Suddenly I stopped, for my ear caught the sound of a tail gently patting the straw in the cavernous old stable beyond my spaniel's kennel. I looked in and saw a pair of eyes gleaming like opals in the gloom. Then the tawny body of Mirza, the mother, rose from the straw and came slowly and apologetically toward me with her head lowered.
"Suzette!" I called, "how did she get here?"
"The boy of Monsieur de Savignac brought her an hour ago, monsieur," answered the little maid. "There is a note for monsieur. I have left it on the table."
I went in, lighted the fire, and read the following:
"The Garçonnière, Saturday.
"Take her, my friend. I can no longer keep her with me. You have the son, it is only right you should have the mother. We leave for Paris to-morrow. We shall meet there soon, I trust. If you come here, do not bring her with you. I said good-bye to her this morning.