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Updated: May 31, 2025
On the morning of the last day in the week, Emily had a little talk in private with her old schoolmistress. Miss Ladd listened to what she had to say of Mrs. Ellmother, and did her best to relieve Emily's anxieties. "I think you are mistaken, my child, in supposing that Francine is in earnest. It is her great fault that she is hardly ever in earnest.
"Not more than a quarter of an hour, I should think." "Did anything remarkable occur in the course of conversation?" "Nothing whatever." Alban interfered for the first time. "Did you say anything," he asked, "which agitated or offended Miss Brown?" "That's rather an extraordinary question," Francine remarked. "Have you no other answer to give?" Alban inquired.
On the other hand, it was much to gain a friendly companion and pass arm-in-arm with him to the ticket-office. Leaving every other plan uncertain, I determined to start from Carlsruhe in his diplomatic shadow. I dashed with surprising agility into the house to ask for my account with Francine.
Francine could not explain to herself the mocking gaiety of her mistress. It was not the joy of love, a woman never mistakes that; it was rather an expression of concentrated maliciousness, which to Francine's mind boded evil.
"It begins at three o'clock," the housemaid went on, "and, what with practicing and rehearsing, and ornamenting the schoolroom, there's a hubbub fit to make a person's head spin. Besides which," said the girl, lowering her voice, and approaching a little nearer to Francine, "we have all been taken by surprise. The first thing in the morning Miss Jethro left us, without saying good-by to anybody."
I hope you got your breakfast, Miss de Sor. What have you been doing here, all by yourself?" "I have been making an interesting discovery," Francine replied. "An interesting discovery in our garden? What can it be?" "The drawing-master, my dear, is in love with Emily. Perhaps she doesn't care about him. Or, perhaps, I have been an innocent obstacle in the way of an appointment between them."
"My mistress was very particular about her hair," Mrs. Ellmother answered. "Are you a good needlewoman?" "As good as ever I was with the help of my spectacles." Francine turned to Emily. "See how well we get on together. We are beginning to understand each other already. I am an odd creature, Mrs. Ellmother. Sometimes, I take sudden likings to persons I have taken a liking to you.
"Oh, yes, M'sieur le Comte," said Francine, who understood nothing. "So I am resolved to marry." "M'sieur will marry!" cried Francine, who spilled half her soup with the shock. "Perfectly. It is for that I have asked you to keep me company." "M'sieur you M'sieur wants to marry me!" "Parbleu!" "M'sieur M'sieur wants to marry me!" "I ask you formally to be my wife."
The Comte, listening attentively, perceived near the stable his entire domestic staff reclining happily on the arm of Andoche, the Sapeur-Pompier, the hero of a dozen fires. "No, there are no longer any servants!" he exclaimed, with a bitterness that caused a stir in the pack; then angrily he shouted with all his forces: "Francine! Hey, there, Francine! Come here at once!"
Buried in eglantine and honeysuckle, soon no one would suspect the home-made character of Joliet's château. It became the centre of my botanizing excursions. Francine grew into a fair, slim girl, like the sweetest and most innocent of Gavarni's sketches, and sold flowers to the passers-by. Such were the souvenirs I had of this brave tavern-keeper in his old capacity of roadster and tramp.
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