“Everything I want! It’s absurd!”
Her eyes filled with sudden seriousness.
“Someone watches over us. It is a benediction. Let us not forget.”
And then she showed him her blue tin.
“There are dozens of these scattered about in the buildings. We ought to take care of them. They may help to feed some of the others when they come.”
Brent’s heart blessed her.
“No wonder we are lucky,” he said.
They went to look at the ladder. Manon had discovered it lying behind one of the sheds; it was a thirty-rung ladder, and Brent saw that the right pole needed splinting about three feet from the top.
“Just long enough,” was the verdict, “I think I’ll take this home before anyone else borrows it.”
He shouldered the ladder and marched off, and on his way back met Manon trundling the barrow along the Rue Romaine. She had loaded the tools into it, and the iron wheel was making a fine clatter over the cobbles.