“Here it is—­here’s your money!” cried he with a joyful laugh; “a watch, a good one!  I always said it would keep for a drink on a dry day; but it is not I who will drink it, but the young one.  Ah! ah! ah! go and sell it for me, neighbor, and if that is not enough, I have my earrings.  Eh!  Genevieve, take them off for me; the earrings will square all!  They shall not say you have been disgraced on account of the child—­no, not even if I must pledge a bit of my flesh!  My watch, my earrings, and my ring—­get rid of all of them for me at the goldsmith’s; pay the woman, and let the little fool go to sleep.  Give him me, Genevieve; I will put him to bed.”

And, taking the baby from the arms of his mother, he carried him with a firm step to his cradle.

It was easy to perceive the change which took place in Michael from this day.  He cut all his old drinking acquaintances.  He went early every morning to his work, and returned regularly in the evening to finish the day with Genevieve and Robert.  Very soon he would not leave them at all, and he hired a place near the fruit-shop, and worked in it on his own account.

They would soon have been able to live in comfort, had it not been for the expenses which the child required.  Everything was given up to his education.  He had gone through the regular school training, had studied mathematics, drawing, and the carpenter’s trade, and had only begun to work a few months ago.  Till now, they had been exhausting every resource which their laborious industry could provide to push him forward in his business; and, happily, all these exertions had not proved useless:  the seed had brought forth fruit, and the days of harvest were close by.

While I was thus recalling these remembrances to my mind, Michael had come in, and was occupied in fixing shelves where they were wanted.

During the time I was writing the notes of my journal, I was also scrutinizing the joiner.

The excesses of his youth and the labor of his manhood have deeply marked his face; his hair is thin and gray, his shoulders stoop, his legs are shrunken and slightly bent.  There seems a sort of weight in his whole being.  His very features have an expression of sorrow and despondency.  He answers my questions by monosyllables, and like a man who wishes to avoid conversation.  Whence comes this dejection, when one would think he had all he could wish for?  I should like to know!

Ten o’clock.—­Michael is just gone downstairs to look for a tool he has forgotten.  I have at last succeeded in drawing from him the secret of his and Genevieve’s sorrow.  Their son Robert is the cause of it!

Not that he has turned out ill after all their care—­not that he is idle or dissipated; but both were in hopes he would never leave them any more.  The presence of the young man was to have renewed and made glad their lives once more; his mother counted the days, his father prepared everything to receive their dear associate in their toils; and at the moment when they were thus about to be repaid for all their sacrifices, Robert had suddenly informed them that he had just engaged himself to a contractor at Versailles.