"Well, Rosalie," answered Jeanne, "I know I shall not live to be very old, and I shall have enough until I die." "Very likely you will, madame," replied Rosalie, getting angry; "but how about M. Paul? Don't you mean to leave him anything?" Jeanne shuddered. "Pray, don't ever speak to me about him; I cannot bear to think of him." "Yes, but I want to talk to you about him, because you don't look at things in the right light, Madame Jeanne. He may be doing all sorts of foolish things now, but he won't always behave the same. He'll marry and then he'll want money to educate his children and to bring them up properly. Now listen to what I am going to say; you must sell Les Peuples--" But Jeanne started up in bed. "Sell Les Peuples! How can you think of such a thing? No! I will never sell the chateau!" Rosalie was not in the least put out. "But I say you will, madame, simply because you must." Then she explained her plans and her calculations. She had already found a purchaser for Les Peuples and the two adjoining farms, and when they had been sold Jeanne would still have four farms at Saint Leonard, which, freed from the mortgages, would bring in about eight thousand three hundred francs a year. Out of this income thirteen hundred francs would have to go for the keeping up and repairing of the property; two thousand would be put by for unforeseen expenses, and Jeanne would have five thousand francs to live upon. "Everything else is gone, so there's an end of it," said Rosalie. "But, in future, I shall keep the money and M. Paul sha'n't have another penny off you. He'd take your last farthing." "But if he has not anything to eat?" murmured Jeanne, who was quietly weeping. "He can come to us if he's hungry; there'll always be victuals and a bed for him. He'd never have got into trouble if you hadn't given him any money the first time he asked for some." "But he was in debt; he would have been dishonored." "And don't you think he'll get into debt just the same when you've no more money to give him? You have paid his debts up to now, so well and good; but you won't pay any more, I can tell you. And now, good-night, madame." And away she went. The idea of selling Les Peuples and leaving the house where she had passed all her life threw Jeanne into a state of extreme agitation, and she lay awake the whole night. "I shall never be able to go away from here," she said, when Rosalie came into the room next morning. "You'll have to, all the same, madame," answered the maid with rising temper. "The lawyer is coming presently with the man who wants to buy the chateau, and, if you don't sell it, you won't have a blade of grass to call your own in four years' time." "Oh, I cannot! I cannot!" moaned Jeanne. But an hour afterwards came a letter from Paul asking for ten thousand francs. What was to be done? Jeanne did not know, and, in her distress, she consulted Rosalie, who shrugged her shoulders, and observed: