Part 22 (2/2)

”No, everything is coming up well. The spring crop of oats is promising; what is going to the bad?”

”I heard at Saint Jean-de-Mont that there is to be a sale of the furniture at the Chateau, father!”

For a moment Toussaint Lumineau could not take it in.

”Yes, all the furniture,” repeated Andre. ”It is advertised in the papers. See, if you don't believe me, here's the list. Everything is to be sold.”

He drew a paper from his pocket, and pointed with his finger to an advertis.e.m.e.nt, from which the old farmer laboriously read:

”On Sunday, February 20th, Maitre Oulry, notary at Chalons, will proceed to sell the furniture of the Chateau de la Fromentiere. There will be sold: the entire drawing-room and dining-room furniture, old tapestries, oak chests, pictures, beds, tables, china and gla.s.s, wines, guns, contents of the library, wardrobes, etc.”

”Well?” exclaimed Andre.

”Oh,” returned his father, ”who would have foretold this eight years ago? Have they become poor, then, in Paris?” He fell into silence, not willing to judge his master too hardly.

”It is ruin,” said Andre. ”After the furniture, they will be for selling the land, and us with it!”

The head of La Fromentiere, the successor of so many farmers under the same masters, was standing in the middle of the room; he raised his weary eyes until they rested upon the little copper crucifix hanging at the head of his bed, then let them fall again in sign of acceptance.

”It will be a great misfortune,” he said, ”but it will not hinder our working!”

And he went out, perhaps to shed tears.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE AUCTION.

In the ensuing week the coming sale at the Chateau was the frequent subject of discussion among the men of La Fromentiere. Andre openly attacked the masters.

”They are ruined,” he said. ”All the n.o.bles go the same road, because they do nothing. So much the worse for them!”

”So much the worse for the farmers,” replied his father; ”they do not often gain much by changing masters.”

Toussaint Lumineau was painfully hit by the coming event, not only in his sincere and lifelong affection for the master's family, but in his honest pride as a peasant.

It was a humiliation to hear people talk of the downfall of the family to whom the Lumineaus were allied by traditions of generations; he took his share of the blame, his share of the disgrace; he felt he had lost stability, that in future he must be exposed to chances and changes, like so many another; and even found himself envying those whose farms belonged to wealthy proprietors, clear of mortgage.

”No,” he resumed, ”you do wrong to speak as you do, Driot. Our masters may have their reasons for this, of which we know nothing. Perhaps M.

le Marquis is about to marry his daughter, and is in want of ready money. Rich and poor alike find it an expensive business to settle their children.”

”If that is their only means to obtain money, they must be at a pretty low ebb!” rejoined Andre. ”To think that even family portraits are to be sold. I remember seeing them one day when I went with you to pay the rent.”

”Bah! Perhaps they were not good likenesses. Besides, the Marquis probably has others. How are people in our station in life to know all that families like theirs possess?”

”And personal clothing? Is that usually sold? It is not very creditable in them to let everything go in a public sale, as if they were bankrupts.”

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