"Without doubt, my dear aunt. Life itself is a joke; and death is the best joke of all. The only trouble is to see the point of it, whether it is man, God, or the devil who is fooled. For me, I think it is the devil who is the butt, and I laugh at him. Ha! Ha! Foolish old devil! We make him think that we belong to him, and in the end we die in the odour of sanctity. Ha! Ha! What a joke! You see it, my lovely aunt?"
"Sacre!" said Mère Tabeau. "Sacré!"
"If that is all you have to say I think that I will go to bed," drawled Pamphile, with a yawn.
"No, no, my nephew, let us talk a while. Such a night of adventure we have not had for many a year, not since the smugglers came across from Chateau, with the military after them. That was excitement, if you like. But this affair at La Folie was not so bad. You choose a good night for the fire, my nephew. What?"
Pamphile stared at the old hag.
"I?" he said. "I choose? But no, my wise aunt, it was the good God. That thunderbolt, you know."
"Bah!" she sneered. "It made a big noise, the thunder; knocked a few stones off the chimney, put Jean Baptiste to sleep, but that was all. No, my friend, the good God had nothing to do with it."
"But the fire----"
"Started an hour later, in the wood-pile near the stove."
"My dear aunt, you seem to be well informed."