"They were laborers. My father was feeble and could not work, on account of a beating which the lord, his lord, our lord, gave him: it was really a mercy, for my father had poached a rabbit, a crime of which the penalty is death; but the lord was merciful and said, 'You may give him only a hundred blows with a stick;' and my father was left a cripple."
"And then?"
"My grandfather was a Huguenot. The curé had him sent to the galleys. I was very young then."
"And then?"
"My husband's father was a salt smuggler. The king had him hung."
"And what did your husband do?"
"He used to fight in those times."
"For whom?"
"For the king."
"And after that?"