"And you cannot even give me any news of him? I am anxious about him. I had hoped to see him to-day; indeed I came away from home to meet him." "Ah! in that case I understand how it happens that you, who never leave your park, have strayed so far. But you are wrong to follow the fields like that. They are all cut up with brooks that are of no mean size, and I don't know where we are. Ten million devils! How it comes down! This is just the kind of night that Emile arrived in this region. I met him under a big rock where he had gone for shelter, and I had no idea that when I crept in there I put my hand on a friend, a true manly heart, a treasure!" "You are very much attached to him, aren't you? He has tried very often to talk to me about you." "And you would never let him? I suspected as much. He is a man like you; no prouder in the depths of his heart and as ready to give his life as his purse for the unfortunate. But he doesn't lose his temper for nothing, and when he says a pleasant word to you, you aren't afraid that he's going to hit you with a club." "Oh! I know that he's a much better and very much more amiable man than I am. If you see him to-night or to-morrow morning, tell me how he is. Tell him to come and see me, for I am overwhelmed by his sorrow." "And so am I; but I have more hope than you and he. However, if I were rich like you----" "What would you do?" "I don't know; but money makes everything smooth with people of Père Cardonnet's cut. Suppose you should set him up in some business and sacrifice a few hundred thousand francs--you who have three or four millions and no children! He isn't so rich as he seems to be! Perhaps he may have more income than you, but his capital is smaller, I fancy." "So you would approve of buying his son's liberty?" "There are some people who never give anything away, and who sell what they ought to give away. Why, by the blood of the devil, here we are in the pond! Stop! stop! that isn't land, it's water. We have gone too far to the right; but our brains are not fuddled by wine. How are we to get out of this?" "I have no idea; we have been walking a long while, and we ought to be at Boisguilbault." "Wait! wait! I know where I am," said the carpenter. "There's a little clearing behind us with one big tree--wait for the flash and look sharp--there it comes! Yes, I know. There's Mère Marlot's house! The devil! There are sick children there--two have typhoid fever, they say! Never mind, she's a good woman, and at all events you are sure of being well received anywhere on your estates." "Yes, this woman is a tenant of mine if I am not mistaken." "Who doesn't pay you very much or very often, I fancy! Come, give me your hand." "I didn't know that her children were sick," said the marquis as they entered the yard in front of the hovel.