The black dress, as worn as Perrine's skirt but not so dusty, for it had been brushed, was lying on the bed, and served for a cover. They found the seven francs and an Austrian coin. "How much does that make in all?" asked Perrine; "I don't understand French money." "I know very little more than you," replied her mother. Counting the florin at two francs, they found they had nine francs and eighty-five centimes. "You see we have more than what is needed for a doctor," insisted Perrine. "He won't cure me with words; we shall have to buy medicine." "I have an idea. You can imagine that all the time I was walking beside Palikare I did not waste my time just talking to him, although he likes that. I was also thinking of both of us, but mostly of you, mama, because you are sick. And I was thinking of our arrival at Maraucourt. Everybody has laughed at our wagon as we came along, and I am afraid if we go to Maraucourt with it we shall not get much of a welcome. If our relations are very proud, they'll be humiliated. "So I thought," she added, wisely, "that as we don't need the wagon any more, we could sell it. Now that you are ill, no one will let me take their pictures, and even if they would we have not the money to buy the things for developing that we need. We must sell it." "And how much can we get for it?" "We can get something; then there is the camera and the mattress." "Everything," said the sick woman. "But you don't mind, do you, mother, dear?..." "We have lived in this wagon for more than a year," said her mother; "your father died here, and although it's a poor thing, it makes me sad to part with it.... It is all that remains of him ... there is not one of these old things here that does not remind us of him...." She stopped, gasping; the tears were rolling down her cheeks. "Oh, forgive me, mother, for speaking about it," cried Perrine. "My darling, you are right. You are only a child, but you have thought of the things that I should have. I shall not be better tomorrow nor the next day, and we must sell these things, and we must decide to sell...." The mother hesitated. There was a painful silence. "Palikare," said Perrine at last. "You have thought that also?" asked the mother. "Yes," said Perrine, "and I have been so unhappy about it, and sometimes I did not dare look at him for fear he would guess that we were going to part with him instead of taking him to Maraucourt with us. He would have been so happy there after such a long journey." "If we were only sure of a welcome, but they may turn us away. If they do, all we can do then is to lie down by the roadside and die, but no matter what it costs, we must get to Maraucourt, and we must present ourselves as well as we can so that they will not shut their doors upon us...." "Would that be possible, mama?... The memory of papa ... he was so good. Could they be angry with him now he is dead?"