“I don’t know.”

But suddenly, the old woman, as if she feared that he might force her to return, said quickly: 

“I will not go without having seen him.”

“We will wait for him, my dear friend.”

As they turned away, they saw a peasant woman coming towards the house, carrying two tin pails, which appeared to be heavy, and which glistened brightly in the sunlight.

She limped with her right leg, and in her brown, knitted jacket, that was faded by the sun, and washed out by the rain, she looked like a poor, wretched, dirty servant.

“Here is Mamma,” the child said.

When she got close to the house, she looked at the strangers angrily and suspiciously, and then she went in, as if she had not seen them.  She looked old, and had a hard, yellow, wrinkled face, one of those wooden faces like country people so often have.

Monsieur d’Apreval called her back.

“I beg your pardon, Madame, but we came in to know whether you could sell us two glasses of milk.”

She was grumbling when she reappeared in the door, after putting down her pails.

“I don’t sell milk,” she replied.

“We are very thirsty,” he said, “and Madame is old and very tired.  Can we not get something to drink?”

The peasant woman gave them an uneasy and cunning glance, and then she made up her mind.

“As you are here, I will give you some,” she said, going into the house, and almost immediately the child came out and brought two chairs, which she placed under an apple tree, and then the mother in turn brought out two bowls of foaming milk, which she gave to the visitors.  She did not return to the house, however, but remained standing near them, as if to watch them and to find out for what purpose they had come there.

“You have come from Fecamp?” she said.

“Yes,” Monsieur d’Apreval replied, “we are staying at Fecamp for the summer.”

And then after a short silence he continued: 

“Have you any fowls you could sell us, every week?”

The woman hesitated for a moment, and then replied: 

“Yes, I think I have.  I suppose you want young ones?”

“Yes, of course.”

“What do you pay for them in the market?”

D’Apreval, who had not the least idea, turned to his companion: 

“What are you paying for poultry in Fecamp, my dear lady?”

“Four francs, and four francs, fifty centimes,” she said with her eyes full of tears, and the farmer’s wife, who was looking at her askance, in much surprise, asked: 

“Is the lady ill, as she is crying?”

He did not know what to say, and replied with some hesitation: 

“No ... no ... but she lost her watch as we came, a very handsome watch, and that troubles her.  If anybody should find it, please let us know.”

Mother Benedict did not reply, as she thought it a very equivocal soft of answer, but suddenly she exclaimed: