The education of this unfortunate youth had been long since finished, but his parents had left him with Moronval to be initiated into the manners and customs of fashionable society. All these persons treated Jack with a certain air of condescension. He remained Master Jack to but one person—that was that most amiable of women, Madame Moronval, who wore the same silk dress that he had seen her in years before. He cared little whether he was called “Master Jack,” or “My boy,”—his two months in the hospital, his three years of alcoholic indulgence, the atmosphere of the engine-room, and the final tempestuous conclusion, had caused him such profound exhaustion, such a desire for quiet, that he sat with his pipe between his teeth, silent and half asleep. “He is intoxicated,” said D’Argent on sometimes. This was not the case; but the young man found his only pleasure in the society of his mother on the rare occasions when the poet was absent. Then he drew his chair close to hers, and listened to her rather than talk himself. Her voice made a delicious murmur in his ears like that of the first bees on a warm spring day. Once, when they were alone, he said to Charlotte, very slowly, “When I was a child I went on a long voyage—did I not?” She looked at him a little troubled. It was the first time in his life that he had asked a question in regard to his history. “Why do you wish to know?” “Because, three years ago, the first day that I was on board a steamer, I had a singular sensation. It seemed to me that I had seen it all before; the cabins, and the narrow ladders, impressed me as familiar; it seemed to me that I had once played on those very stairs.” She looked around to assure herself that they were entirely alone. “It was not a dream, Jack. You were three years old when we came from Algiers. Your father died suddenly, and we came back to Tours.” “What was my father’s name?” She hesitated, much agitated, for she was not prepared for this sudden curiosity; and yet she could not refuse to answer these questions. “He was called by one of the grandest names in France, my child—by a name that you and I would bear to-day if a sudden and terrible catastrophe had not prevented him from repairing his fault. Ah, we were very young when we met! I must tell you that at that time I had a perfect passion for the chase. I remember a little Arabian horse called Soliman—” She was gone, at full speed, mounted on this horse, and Jack made no effort to interrupt her—he knew that it was useless. But when she stopped to take breath, he profited by this brief halt to return to his fixed idea. “What was my father’s name?” he repeated.