bachelor. When Jean-Jacques incurred the anger of his mistress, the

little attentions and vulgar fondlings which were all his joy were
suddenly suppressed. Flore sent her master, as the children say, into

disgrace. No more tender glances, no more of the caressing little
words in various tones with which she decked her conversation,--"my

kitten," "my old darling," "my bibi," "my rat," etc. A "you," cold and
sharp and ironically respectful, cut like the blade of a knife through

the heart of the miserable old bachelor. The "you" was a declaration
of war. Instead of helping the poor man with his toilet, handing him

what he wanted, forestalling his wishes, looking at him with the sort
of admiration which all women know how to express, and which, in some

cases, the coarser it is the better it pleases,--saying, for instance,
"You look as fresh as a rose!" or, "What health you have!" "How

handsome you are, my old Jean!"--in short, instead of entertaining him
with the livelychatter and broad jokes in which he delighted, Flore

left him to dress alone. If he called her, she answered from the foot
of the staircase, "I can't do everything at once; how can I look after

your breakfast and wait upon you up there? Are not you big enough to
dress your own self?"

"Oh, dear! what have I done to displease her?" the old man asked
himself that morning, as he got one of these rebuffs after calling for

his shaving-water.
"Vedie, take up the hot water," cried Flore.

"Vedie!" exclaimed the poor man, stupefied with fear of the anger that
was crushing him. "Vedie, what is the matter with Madame this

morning?"
Flore Brazier required her master and Vedie and Kouski and Max to call

her Madame.
"She seems to have heard something about you which isn't to your

credit," answered Vedie, assuming an air of deep concern. "You are
doing wrong, monsieur. I'm only a poor servant-woman, and you may say

I have no right to poke my nose into your affairs; but I do say you
may search through all the women in the world, like that king in holy

Scripture, and you won't find the equal of Madame. You ought to kiss
the ground she steps on. Goodness! if you make her unhappy, you'll

only spoil your own life. There she is, poor thing, with her eyes full
of tears."

Vedie left the poor man utterly cast down; he dropped into an armchair
and gazed into vacancy like the melancholy imbecile that he was, and

forgot to shave. These alternations of tenderness and severity worked
upon this feeble creature whose only life was through his amorous

fibre, the same morbid effect which great changes from tropical heat
to arctic cold produce upon the human body. It was a moral pleurisy,

which wore him out like a physical disease. Flore alone could thus
affect him; for to her, and to her alone, he was as good as he was

foolish.
"Well, haven't you shaved yet?" she said, appearing at his door.

Her sudden presence made the old man start violently" target="_blank" title="ad.强暴地；猛烈地">violently; and from being
pale and cast down he grew red for an instant, without, however,

daring to complain of her treatment.
"Your breakfast is waiting," she added. "You can come down as you are,

in dressing-gown and slippers; for you'll breakfast alone, I can tell
you."

Without waiting for an answer, she disappeared. To make him breakfast
alone was the punishment he dreaded most; he loved to talk to her as

he ate his meals. When he got to the foot of the staircase he was
taken with a fit of coughing; for emotion excited his catarrh.

"Cough away!" said Flore in the kitchen, without caring whether he
heard her or not. "Confound the old wretch! he is able enough to get

over it without bothering others. If he coughs up his soul, it will
only be after--"

Such were the amenities the Rabouilleuse addressed to Rouget when she
was angry. The poor man sat down in deep distress at a corner of the

table in the middle of the room, and looked at his old furniture and
the old pictures with a disconsolate air.

"You might at least have put on a cravat," said Flore. "Do you think
it is pleasant for people to see such a neck as yours, which is redder

and more wrinkled than a turkey's?"
"But what have I done?" he asked, lifting his big light-green eyes,

full of tears, to his tormentor, and trying to face her hard
countenance.

"What have you done?" she exclaimed. "As if you didn't know? Oh, what
a hypocrite! Your sister Agathe--who is as much your sister as I am

sister of the tower of Issoudun, if one's to believe your father, and
who has no claim at all upon you--is coming here from Paris with her

son, a miserable two-penny painter, to see you."
"My sister and my nephews coming to Issoudun!" he said, bewildered.

"Oh, yes! play the surprised, do; try to make me believe you didn't
send for them! sewing your lies with white bread, indeed! Don't fash

yourself; we won't trouble your Parisians--before they set their feet
in this house, we shall have shaken the dust of it off ours. Max and I

will be gone, never to return. As for your will, I'll tear it in
quarters under your nose, and to your very beard--do you hear? Leave

your property to your family, if you don't think we are your family;
and then see if you'll be loved for yourself by a lot of people who

have not seen you for thirty years,--who in fact have never seen you!
Is it that sort of sister who can take my place? A pinchbeck saint!"

"If that's all, my little Flore," said the old man, "I won't receive
my sister, or my nephews. I swear to you this is the first word I have

heard of their coming. It is all got up by that Madame Hochon--a
sanctimonious old--"

Max, who had overheard old Rouget's words, entered suddenly, and said
in a masterful tone,--

"What's all this?"
"My good Max," said the old man, glad to get the protection of the

soldier who, by agreement with Flore, always took his side in a
dispute, "I swear by all that is most sacred, that I now hear this

news for the first time. I have never written to my sister; my father
made me promise not to leave her any of my property; to leave it to

the Church sooner than to her. Well, I won't receive my sister Agathe
to this house, or her sons--"

"Your father was wrong, my dear Jean-Jacques, and Madame Brazier is
still more wrong," answered Max. "Your father no doubt had his

reasons, but he is dead, and his hatred should die with him. Your
sister is your sister, and your nephews are your nephews. You owe it

to yourself to welcome them, and you owe it to us as well. What would
people say in Issoudun? Thunder! I've got enough upon my shoulders as

it is, without hearing people say that we shut you up and don't allow
you a will of your own, or that we influence you against your

relations and are trying to get hold of your property. The devil take
me if I don't pull up stakes and be off, if that sort of calumny is to

be flung at me! the other is bad enough! Let's eat our breakfast."
Flore, who was now as mild as a weasel, helped Vedie to set the table.

Old Rouget, full of admiration for Max, took him by both hands and led
him into the recess of a window, saying in a low voice:--

"Ah! Max, if I had a son, I couldn't love him better than I love you.
Flore is right: you two are my real family. You are a man of honor,

Max, and what you have just said is true."
"You ought to receive and entertain your sister and her son, but not

change the arrangements you have made about your property," said Max.
"In that way you will do what is right in the eyes of the world, and

yet keep your promise to your father."
"Well! my dear loves!" cried Flore, gayly, "the salmi is getting cold.

Come, my old rat, here's a wing for you," she said, smiling on Jean-