"Because you will be my wife, Mariette,--because you will mourn for my father with me,--because you will share my grief, will he be less deeply regretted? Besides, Mariette, crushed with grief, as I am, I could not live on alone, separated from you,--all I have left in the world now. It would kill me." "I am only a poor seamstress who knows little or nothing of the laws of society, so I can only tell you how I feel about this matter, Louis. Though a moment ago the idea of marrying you at once seemed almost a breach of propriety, the reasons you give have made me change my mind. Possibly I am wrong; possibly it is the desire to please you that influences me, but now I should not feel the slightest remorse if I married you at once, and yet it seems to me that I am as susceptible as any one I know." "Yes, and more ungrateful than any one I know," exclaimed Madame Lacombe, tartly, raising herself up in bed. Then, seeing the surprise depicted on the features of her goddaughter and Louis, she added, in sneering tones: "Yes, you thought the old woman asleep, and so took advantage of the opportunity to decide all about the wedding, but I heard everything you said, everything--" "There was nothing said that we were unwilling for you to hear, madame," replied Louis, gravely. "Mariette and I have no desire to retract a single word we have uttered." "I am certain of that, for you two think only of yourselves. You seem to have no other idea in your head except this detestable marriage. As for me, one might suppose I was already in my coffin. I tell you once for all that--" "Permit me to interrupt you, madame," said Louis, "and to prove to you that I have not forgotten my promise." As he spoke, he took a small box which he had deposited upon the table at his entrance, and placed it on Madame Lacombe's bed, saying, as he handed her a key: "Will you be kind enough to open this box, madame? The contents belong to you." Madame Lacombe took the key with a suspicious air, opened the box, looked in, and exclaimed, like one both dazzled and stupefied: "Good God! Good God!" Recovering from her bewilderment at last, the sick woman emptied the contents of the box out upon the bed; but it seemed as if she could not believe her eyes when she saw the big pile of glittering gold coins before her. "Oh, what a pile of gold! What a pile of gold!" she exclaimed, ecstatically. "And it is real gold--not a counterfeit piece among it. Great Heavens! What big, handsome coins they are! They must be one hundred sou pieces at least. What an immense amount of money this must be! Enough to make two poor women like Mariette and me comfortable for life," she added, with a sigh. "You have about fifteen thousand francs there, madame," replied Louis. "They are yours." "Mine?" cried the sick woman, "mine?" Then, shaking her head with an incredulous air, she said, sharply, "Why do you want to mock an old woman? How can this gold belong to me?"