"Ask where the money is hid," she hissed in a shrill whisper. "Ask—ask—while he can yet understand."
He understood, for a smile grim and horrible disturbed his tight lips a moment.
Folle-Farine did not hear.
"Tell me of my mother;—tell me, tell me," she muttered. Since a human love had been born in her heart, she had thought often of that mother whose eyes had never looked on her, and whose breast had never fed her.
His face changed, but he did not speak; he gasped for breath, and lay silent; his eyes trembled and confused; it might be that in that moment remorse was with him, and the vain regrets of cruel years.
It might be that dying thus, he knew that from his hearth, as from hell, mother and child had both been driven whilst his lips had talked of God.
A little bell rang softly in the orchard below the casement; the clear voice of a young boy singing a canticle crossed the voice of the linnet; there was a gleam of silver in the sun. The Church bore its Host to the dying man.
They turned her from the chamber.
The eyes of one unsanctified might not gaze upon mysteries of the blest.
She went out without resistance; she was oppressed and stupefied; she went to the stairs, and there sat down again, resting her forehead on her hands.