Madame Tank put up her hand, and the other stopped.
"But that was a child," Madame Grignon then objected.
"Nine years ago. He would be about eighteen now."
"How old are you?" they both put to me.
Remembering what my father had told Doctor Chantry, I was obliged to own that I was about eighteen. Annabel de Chaumont sat on the lowest log of the chimney with her feet on a bench, and her chin in her hand, interested to the point of silence. Something in her eyes made it very galling to be overhauled and have my blemishes enumerated before her and Croghan. What had uplifted me to Madame de Ferrier's recognition now mocked, and I found it hard to submit. It would not go well with the next stranger who declared he knew me by my scars.
"What do they call you in this country?" inquired Madame Tank.
I said my name was Lazarre Williams.
"It is not!" she said in an undertone, shaking her head.
I made bold to ask with some warmth what my name was then, and she whispered—"Poor child!"
It seemed that I was to be pitied in any case. In dim self-knowledge I saw that the core of my resentment was her treating me with commiseration. Madame de Ferrier had not treated me so.