“His jacket is very poor!” little Renée remarked mercilessly, “and his shoes are coarse—are you a beggar?” she added, addressing him.
“No,” replied Péron, with passionate indignation, “I am not a beggar or a thief, any more than you are!”
“You are an impertinent child!” said Mademoiselle Lucien, drawing her little charge nearer to her; “if you do not go away I will call one of the men to put you out with a whipping!”
“That you shall not!” cried Péron, his face scarlet with indignation; “no one ever whipped me—I would kill any one who did!” and he clenched his fists and faced them like a fury.
“Ciel!” exclaimed mademoiselle, “he is a little savage; come away, Renée!”
But her charge was not inclined to go. She was a spoiled child and not accustomed to obeying her governess. She found Péron more interesting than the humble village children whom she was accustomed to order about at her will.
“I will not go, mademoiselle,” she said wilfully; “I want to know why he has come here in his poor jacket and his coarse boots!”
Péron was not given to conversation, but he was a child who had listened and thought, and the shyness which had sealed his lips at Archambault’s did not possess him to-day. He forgot it, for he was burning with indignation at the manner in which this little demoiselle treated him.
“You are ill-mannered to speak of my boots,” he said gravely. “Père Antoine says that a beggar may be the same as the king, in heaven.”
Mademoiselle Lucien laughed. “What have we here?” she exclaimed; “is this an infant preacher?”