Volume II Part 4 (1/2)

He did not sleep that night The idea of the child especially harrassed him His son! Oh! If he could only have known, have been sure? But what could he have done? However, he went to the house where she had lived, and asked about her He was told that a neighbor, an honorable man of strict morals, had been touched by her distress, and had married her; he knew the fault she had conized the child, his, Francois Tessier's child, as his own

He returned to the _Parc Monceau_ every Sunday, for then he always saw her, and each ti, to take his son into his arms, cover him with kisses and to steal him, to carry him off

He suffered horribly in his wretched isolation as an old bachelor, with nobody to care for him, and he also suffered atrociousfro one's own children, which nature has implanted into all, and so at last he deter up to her, as she entered the park, he said, standing in thelips: ”You do not recognize me” She raised her eyes, looked at hi the two children by the hand she rushed away, dragging them after her, whilst he went home and wept, inconsolably

Months passed without his seeing her again, but he suffered, day and night, for he was a prey to his paternal love He would gladly have died, if he could only have kissed his son, he would have coer, ventured anything He wrote to her, but she did not reply, and after writing her so her determination, and then he for quite prepared to receive a bullet from a revolver, if need be

His letter only consisted of a few lines, as follows:

”Monsieur,

”You must have a perfect horror of my name, but I am so miserable, so overcome by misery, that my only hope is in you, and therefore I venture to request you to grant me an interview of only five minutes”

”I have the honor, etc”

The next day he received the reply:

”Monsieur,

”I shall expect you to-morrow, Tuesday, at five o'clock”

V

As he went up the staircase, Francois Tessier's heart beat so violently that he had to stop several times There was a dull and violent noise in his breast, the noise as of so, and he could only breathe with difficulty, and had to hold on to the banisters in order not to fall

He rang the bell on the third floor, and when a maidservant had opened the door, he asked ”Does Monsieur Flamel live here?” ”Yes Monsieur

Kindly co-roo bewildered, as in the midst of a catastrophe, until a door opened and a man came in He was tall, serious, and rather stout, and wore a black frock-coat, and pointed to a chair with his hand Francois Tessier sat down, and then said, panting: ”MonsieurMonsieurI do not knohether you know my namewhether you know ”

Monsieur Flamel interrupted him ”You need not tell it me, Monsieur, I know it My wife has spoken to ood man ishes to be severe, and with the common-place stateliness of an honorable man, and Francois Tessier continued: ”Well, Monsieur, I want to say this: I arief, of remorse, of shame, and I would like once, only once to kissthe child ”

Monsieur Fla the bell, and when the servant caone out, they re more to say to one another, and waited Then, suddenly, a little boy of ten rushed into the room, and ran up to the man whom he believed to be his father, but he stopped when he saw a stranger, and Monsieur Flaentleman, my dear” And the child went up to hier

Francois Tessier had risen, he let his hat fall, and was ready to fall himself as he looked at his son, while Monsieur Fla of delicacy, and was looking out of the

The child waited in surprise, but he picked up the hat and gave it to the stranger Then Francois, taking the child up in his aran to kiss him wildly all over his face, on his eyes, his cheeks, on his htened at the shower of kisses tried to avoid them, turned away his head and pushed away the man's face with his little hands But suddenly, Francois Tessier put him down, and cried: ”Good-bye! Good-bye!” And he rushed out of the room as if he had been a thief

A VAGABOND

Forfor work everywhere

He had left his native place, Ville-Avary, in the department of la Manche, because there was no work to be had He was a journeyood worked to live on his faeneral stoppage of work Bread was getting scarce with them; the two sisters went out as charwoest of the to do, and ate the others'

soup

Then he went and inquired at the town-hall, and the mayor's secretary told him that he would find work at the Labor-center, and so he started, well provided with papers and certificates, and carrying another pair of shoes, a pair of trousers and a shi+rt, in a blue handkerchief at the end of his stick

And he had walked al inter that mysterious country where workmen find work At first he had the fixed idea that he must only work because he was a carpenter, but at every carpenter's shop where he applied he was told that they had just dis himself at the end of his resources, he ht come across on the road And so by turns he was a navvy, stableman, stone sawer; he split wood, lopped the branches of trees, dug wells, oats on a mountain, and all for a few pence, for he only obtained two or three days work occasionally, by offering himself at a shamefully low price, in order to tempt the avarice of employers and peasants

And now, for a week he had found nothing, and he had noa piece of bread, thanks to the charity of soed at house doors, on the road It was getting dark, and Jacques Randel, jaded, his legs failing him, his sto barefoot on the grass by the side of the road, for he was taking care of his last pair of shoes, as the other pair had already ceased to exist for a long time It was a Saturday, towards the end of autuh the sky by the gusts of hich whistled a the trees, and one felt that it would rain soon The country was deserted at that ti, and on the eve of Sunday Here and there in the fields there rose up stacks of thrashed out corn, like huge yellow mushrooms, and the fields looked bare, as they had already been sown for the next year