And the good Fanchette, with her eyes full of tears of joy, kissed everybody and exclaimed:
'He has not changed a bit, you see. I told you so; I knew it.'
Then the young couple came twice a year to Brittany to live and love with more freedom. Soon, instead of two, it was a trio that came, and Fanchette declared that the loveliest baby in the world was the one that she called hers.
'And,' she added, 'no one can accuse me of partiality, for everyone knows how I laugh at the people who think their babies the finest in the world.'
And the others would reply in chorus:
'Certainly not, Fanchette.'
Madame Proquet was overwhelmed with joy, the proudest and happiest of mothers.
She went so far as to say to her neighbours, as well as to herself: 'Did I not do well after all to encourage Henri to be an artist!' I say advisedly 'as well as to herself,' for by dint of innocently and honestly deceiving others, one ends by innocently and honestly deceiving one's self.
Madame Proquet had no more fear for her son's future. His fame was well established, and he remained to her the same devoted son, perfectly unaffected, his head turned neither by celebrity nor riches.
The good lady unhappily reckoned without that very absorbing mistress called Art, who was to supplant her a little, if not in Henri's affection, yet in his rule of conduct. The name of Henri Proquet was not celebrated in Paris alone, but in all the capitals of the civilized world. He one day wrote to his mother that he had just received from England a most flattering invitation to go and paint the portrait of the Queen and the principal members of the Royal Family, and that he had resolved to settle in London with his family for several years; for no doubt, after the Royal Family, his brush would be in demand by lords and ladies, and he would return from the land of fogs laden with guineas and glory.