Denise halted in front of the solitary hovel, the aspect of which seemed to her more wretched than ever, because Death casts a dark pall over everything wherever he passes. The girl was surprised to find nobody about; she drew nearer and bursts of laughter fell upon her ears. She concluded that the person was mistaken who had told her of the grandmother's death, and she put her head in at the door. She saw the death bed, beside which a lamp cast a dim light; and close by she saw the child playing with his goat on the straw, and greeting with shouts of laughter Jacqueleine's antics and caresses. That picture caused Denise a peculiar sensation. She entered the cabin and walked toward the child, saying: "What's this, my dear? playing beside your dead grandmother?" "Will that make her mad?" queried the child, with an artless glance at Denise. "No, for she can't hear you; but you ought to be sorry for her death." "Someone told me she wouldn't whip me again." "Didn't you cry when she died?" "No, Denise." "Then you didn't love her?" "Oh! I was awful 'fraid of her!" "My dear, it isn't nice not to have any feeling." "Oh! if my goat died, Denise, I'd cry hard enough; Jacqueleine's so good and she loves me so!" Denise could think of no answer to make to the child; she sent him outside with his goat. On Père Calleux's return, she obtained his permission to take Coco with her for a few days, and Coco took with him his darling goat, from which he refused to part. Denise was anxious to keep the child with her; Mère Fourcy was kindhearted, and Denise showed her that as he grew up Coco would be of use to them, and that the money left by the gentleman from Paris would be more than sufficient to educate him. Père Calleux, who realized that his son could not make his soup, consented to leave him with Denise for the present, and the girl was overjoyed. Behold, then, Coco a member of the little milkmaid's family, and leading a pleasant life. Denise, who knew how to read,--not a rare accomplishment in our villages nowadays,--determined to educate her little protégé, and did not fail to speak to him every day of the handsome gentleman who had paid so generously for his bowl. But another month passed, and the gentleman from Paris did not come again. Denise, who still loved to muse beneath the great oak, often said to herself: "It was quite right to think that he didn't mean a word of all those fine things he said to me. But, when he wasn't coming back, it wasn't worth while for that Monsieur Bertrand to say: 'Look out for yourself!'" VIII A BACHELOR'S MORNING RECEPTION