I paid little heed, I acknowledge, to this debate. Of course the saving of the house was due solely to our father. How could our mother and Aunt Been have helped? It had been necessary to throw out the gentleman from Paris and the other invaders, as Ulysses on his return to Ithaca had thrown out the lovers. That was an exercise of strength which belonged only to a man. My notions of life were simple: the man governed, the woman’s sole charge was of domestic matters. That Aunt Deen had her rights, however diminished, in the building that “they” were trying to get away from us I could never have understood, any more than I could understand what a dowry was, and how the consent of the wife was necessary to enable the husband to dispose of property. Nevertheless I recalled the incident of the dressmaker. Mother had no doubt made some savings in the matter of clothes and turned them in. Does not every one make his contribution to the wars? I immediately slipped out of the room and came back bringing the savings bank in which I had been encouraged to drop such little sous as I received. I expected an ovation for the magnanimity of my sacrifice. Without a word I handed it to my father. “What do you want me to do with it?” was all his response. Somewhat abashed, being gazed upon by all present, I said, blushing furiously: “It is for the house.” This time my father drew me to him and publicly gave me the _accolade_ with the dazzling Order of the Day. “This child will be our joy.” Thus the Emperor rewarded his marshals on the field of battle; nothing in history is surprising to one who has had a childhood like mine. Coming in while the bell was ringing, grandfather was the last one to learn what had happened. Aunt Deen informed him in a fiery harangue. He heard her with interest but without emotion, his serenity all undisturbed. And when the heroic story was finished he nodded his head, vouchsafing merely the words of faint admiration: “Well, well! so much the better!” Things had been arranged with no help from him. V THE ABDICATION IN the days that followed I came to understand by all sorts of small tokens, not to speak of the remarks of servants, that the house no longer belonged to grandfather, but to my parents, and that only a simple formality remained to be accomplished for the treaty to be final. Grandfather no longer having the responsibility--though in truth the responsibility had never weighed heavily upon him--had no desire to keep the honours of headship. More than once I heard father speaking to him to the following effect: “I do not want anything to be changed--I want everything to be as it has always been--I want to take from you nothing but your cares.” “Oho!” grandfather would reply with his little laugh, “you are lucky if you know just what you want.”