“Does she know a little of all that?”
“Of course. She came from an asylum where they learn how to take care of themselves.”
“Tell me, little one,” added the Captain, speaking to the child, “I am not scaring you—no? Well, my good woman, will you let me have her? I want a servant.”
“If you will support her.”
“Then that is finished. Here are twenty francs. Let her have to-night a dress and a shoe. To-morrow we’ll arrange the rest.”
And, with a friendly tap on Pierette’s cheek, the Captain went off, delighted that everything was concluded. Possibly he thought he would have to cut off some glasses of beer and absinthe, and be cautious of the veterinary’s skill at bezique. But that was not worth speaking of, and the new arrangement would be quite the thing.
IV.
Captain, you are a coward!
Such was the apostrophe with which the caryatides of the Café Prosper hereafter greeted the Captain, whose visits became rarer day by day.
For the poor man had not seen all the consequences of his good action. The suppression of his morning absinthe had been sufficient to cover the modest expense of Pierette’s keeping, but how many other reforms were needed to provide for the unforeseen expenses of his bachelor establishment! Full of gratitude, the little girl wished to prove it by her zeal. Already the aspect of his room was changed. The furniture was dusted and arranged, the fireplace cleaned, the floor polished, and spiders no longer spun their webs over the deaths of Poniatowski in the corner. When the Captain came home the inviting odor of cabbage-soup saluted him on the staircase, and the sight of the smoking plates on the coarse but white table-cloth, with a bunch of flowers and polished table-ware, was quite enough to give him a good appetite. Pierette profited by the good-humor of her master to confess some of her secret ambitions. She wanted andirons for the fireplace, where there was now always a fire burning, and a mould for the little cakes that she knew how to make so well. And the Captain, smiling at the child’s requests, but charmed with the homelike