“Are you fond of him?” continued the Doctor. “No, sir,” said the boy. Madame Tentaillon and Desprez exchanged expressive glances. “That is bad, my man,” resumed the latter, with a shade of sternness. “Every one should be fond of the dying, or conceal their sentiments; and your master here is dying. If I have watched a bird a little while stealing my cherries, I have a thought of disappointment when he flies away over my garden wall, and I see him steer for the forest and vanish. How much more a creature such as this, so strong, so astute, so richly endowed with faculties! When I think that, in a few hours, the speech will be silenced, the breath extinct, and even the shadow vanished from the wall, I who never saw him, this lady who knew him only as a guest, are touched with some affection.” The boy was silent for a little, and appeared to be reflecting. “You did not know him,” he replied at last, “he was a bad man.” “He is a little pagan,” said the landlady. “For that matter, they are all the same, these mountebanks, tumblers, artists, and what not. They have no interior.” But the Doctor was still scrutinising the little pagan, his eyebrows knotted and uplifted. “What is your name?” he asked. “Jean-Marie,” said the lad. Desprez leaped upon him with one of his sudden flashes of excitement, and felt his head all over from an ethnological point of view. “Celtic, Celtic!” he said. “Celtic!” cried Madame Tentaillon, who had perhaps confounded the word with hydrocephalous. “Poor lad! is it dangerous?” “That depends,” returned the Doctor grimly. And then once more addressing the boy: “And what do you do for your living, Jean-Marie?” he inquired. “I tumble,” was the answer. “So! Tumble?” repeated Desprez. “Probably healthful. I hazard the guess, Madame Tentaillon, that tumbling is a healthful way of life. And have you never done anything else but tumble?” “Before I learned that, I used to steal,” answered Jean-Marie gravely. “Upon my word!” cried the doctor. “You are a nice little man for your age. Madame, when my _confrère_ comes from Bourron, you will communicate my unfavourable opinion. I leave the case in his hands; but of course, on any alarming symptom, above all if there should be a sign of rally, do not hesitate to knock me up. I am a doctor no longer, I thank God; but I have been one. Good night, madame. Good sleep to you, Jean-Marie.” CHAPTER II. MORNING TALK