“The deuce it was!” exclaimed the little old man, stopping short.  Madame Clapart, Oscar, and he were walking along a terrace flanked by oranges, myrtles, and pomegranates.  “And what did he get?”

“The fourth rank in philosophy,” replied the mother proudly.

“Oh! oh!” cried uncle Cardot, “the rascal has a good deal to do to make up for lost time; for the fourth rank in philosophy, well, it isn’t Peru, you know!  You will stay and breakfast with me?” he added.

“We are at your orders,” replied Madame Clapart.  “Ah! my dear Monsieur Cardot, what happiness it is for fathers and mothers when their children make a good start in life!  In this respect—­indeed, in all others,” she added, catching herself up, “you are one of the most fortunate fathers I have ever known.  Under your virtuous son-in-law and your amiable daughter, the Cocon d’Or continues to be the greatest establishment of its kind in Paris.  And here’s your eldest son, for the last ten years at the head of a fine practice and married to wealth.  And you have such charming little granddaughters!  You are, as it were, the head of four great families.  Leave us, Oscar; go and look at the garden, but don’t touch the flowers.”

“Why, he’s eighteen years old!” said uncle Cardot, smiling at this injunction, which made an infant of Oscar.

“Alas, yes, he is eighteen, my good Monsieur Cardot; and after bringing him so far, sound and healthy in mind and body, neither bow-legged nor crooked, after sacrificing everything to give him an education, it would be hard if I could not see him on the road to fortune.”

“That Monsieur Moreau who got him the scholarship will be sure to look after his career,” said uncle Cardot, concealing his hypocrisy under an air of friendly good-humor.

“Monsieur Moreau may die,” she said.  “And besides, he has quarrelled irrevocably with the Comte de Serizy, his patron.”

“The deuce he has!  Listen, madame; I see you are about to—­”

“No, monsieur,” said Oscar’s mother, interrupting the old man, who, out of courtesy to the “fair lady,” repressed his annoyance at being interrupted.  “Alas, you do not know the miseries of a mother who, for seven years past, has been forced to take a sum of six hundred francs a year for her son’s education from the miserable eighteen hundred francs of her husband’s salary.  Yes, monsieur, that is all we have had to live upon.  Therefore, what more can I do for my poor Oscar?  Monsieur Clapart so hates the child that it is impossible for me to keep him in the house.  A poor woman, alone in the world, am I not right to come and consult the only relation my Oscar has under heaven?”

“Yes, you are right,” said uncle Cardot.  “You never told me of all this before.”

“Ah, monsieur!” replied Madame Clapart, proudly, “you were the last to whom I would have told my wretchedness.  It is all my own fault; I married a man whose incapacity is almost beyond belief.  Yes, I am, indeed, most unhappy.”