Then she added, “We say ‘accidentally’ on father’s account; but you, who knew her so well, may be quite sure that it was by no accident that she perished. She died because she could never see Chariot again. Ah, what wicked men there are in this world!” Jack glanced at his mother, and was quite ready to agree with his companion. “Poor father! we thought that he could not survive the shock,” resumed Zénaïde; “but then he never suspected the truth. When M. Maugin got his position in Paris, we made him come with us, and we live all together in the Rue des Silas at Charonne. You will come and see him, won’t you, Jack? You know he always loved you; and now only the children amuse him. Perhaps you can make him talk. But let us join him; he is looking at us, and thinks we are speaking of him, and he does not like that.” Ida, who was deep in conversation with M. Maugin, stopped short as Jack approached her. He suspected that she had been talking of D’Argenton, as indeed she had, praising his genius and recounting his successes, which, had she confined herself to the truth, would not have taken long. They separated, promising to meet again soon; and Jack, not long afterward, called upon them with his mother. He found the old ornaments on the chimney that he had learned to know so well at Indret, the sponges and corals; he recognized the big wardrobe as an old friend. The rooms were exquisitely clean, and presented a perfect picture of a Breton interior transplanted to Paris. But he soon saw that his mother was bored by Zénaïde, who was too energetic and positive to suit her, and that there, as everywhere else, she was haunted by the same melancholy and the same disgust which she expressed in the brief phrase, “It smells of the work-shop.” The house, the room she lived in, the bread she ate, all seemed impregnated with one smell, one especial flavor. If she opened the window, she perceived it even more strongly; if she went out, each breath of wind brought it to her. The people she saw—even her own Jack, when he returned at night with his blouse spotted with oil—exhaled the same baleful odor, which she fancied clung even to herself—the odor of toil—and filled her with immense sadness. One evening, Jack found his mother in a state of extraordinary excitement; her eyes were bright and complexion animated. “D’Argenton has written to me!” she cried, as he entered the room; “yes, my dear, he has actually dared to write to me. For four months he did not vouchsafe a syllable. He writes me now that he is about to return to Paris, and that, if I need him, he is at my disposal.” “You do not need him, I think,” said Jack, quietly, though he was in reality as much moved as his mother herself. “Of course I do not,” she answered, hurriedly. “And what shall you say?”