"Oh, and to think how I loved you, when I was sitting there at your feet on the ground! It seemed as if I was saved,--that I had nothing more to fear! It was not for the blows which the other women may, perhaps, begin again to give me that I said that I have led a hard life; but it seemed to me that you were my good fortune, and would bring good luck to my child, just because you had pity on me. But, then, when one is used to be ill-treated, one is then more sensible than others to kindness." Then, interrupting herself, to burst again into a loud fit of sobs,--"Well, well, it's done,--it's finished,--all over! And so it must be some day or other. I was wrong to think any otherwise. It's done--done--done!" "Courage! Courage! I will think of you, as you will remember me." "Oh, as to that, they may tear me to pieces before they shall ever make me forget you! I may grow old,--as old as the streets,--but I shall always have your angel face before me. The first word I will teach my child shall be your name, Goualeuse; for but for you it would have perished with cold." "Listen to me, Mont Saint-Jean!" said Fleur-de-Marie, deeply affected by the attachment of this unhappy woman. "I cannot promise to do anything for you, although I know some very charitable persons; but, for your child, it is a different thing; it is wholly innocent; and the persons of whom I speak will, perhaps, take charge of it, and bring it up, when you can resolve on parting from it." "Part from it! Never, oh, never!" exclaimed Mont Saint-Jean, with excitement. "What would become of me now, when I have so built upon it?" "But how will you bring it up? Boy or girl, it ought to be made honest; and for that--" "It must eat honest bread. I know that, Goualeuse,--I believe it. It is my ambition; and I say so to myself every day. So, in leaving here, I will never put my foot under a bridge again. I will turn rag-picker, street-sweeper,--something honest; for I owe that, if not to myself, at least to my child, when I have the honour of having one," she added, with a sort of pride. "And who will take care of your child whilst you are at work?" inquired the Goualeuse. "Will it not be better, if possible, as I hope it will be, to put it in the country with some worthy people, who will make a good country girl or a stout farmer's boy of it? You can come and see it from time to time; and one day you may, perhaps, find the means to live near it constantly. In the country, one lives on so little!" "Yes, but to separate myself from it,--to separate myself from it! It would be my only joy,--I, who have nothing else in the world to love,--nothing that loves me!" "You must think more of it than of yourself, my poor Mont Saint-Jean. In two or three days I will write to Madame Armand, and if the application I mean to make in favour of your child should succeed, you will have no occasion to say to it, as you said so painfully just now, 'Alas! What will become of it?'"