He folds up his knife, pockets it, and goes off alongside the wall, possessed by the thought of his jaw-bones’ new lease of life.

Once more we put up our beggars’ petition:  “Good-day, madame; you haven’t got a little corner where we could feed?  We would pay, of course, we would pay—­”

Through the glass of the low window we see lifted the face of an old man—­like a fish in a bowl, it looks—­a face curiously flat, and lined with parallel wrinkles, like a page of old manuscript.

“You’ve the little shed there.”

“There’s no room in the shed, and when the washing’s done there—­”

Barque seizes the chance.  “It’ll do very likely.  May we see it?”

“We do the washing there,” mutters the woman, continuing to wield her broom.

“You know,” says Barque, with a smile and an engaging air, “we’re not like those disagreeable people who get drunk and make themselves a nuisance.  May we have a look?”

The woman has let her broom rest.  She is thin and inconspicuous.  Her jacket hangs from her shoulders as from a valise.  Her face is like cardboard, stiff and without expression.  She looks at us and hesitates, then grudgingly leads the way into a very dark little place, made of beaten earth and piled with dirty linen.

“It’s splendid,” cries Lamuse, in all honesty.

“Isn’t she a darling, the little kiddie!” says Barque, as he pats the round cheek, like painted india-rubber, of a little girl who is staring at us with her dirty little nose uplifted in the gloom.  “Is she yours, madame?”

“And that one, too?” risks Marthereau, as he espies an over-ripe infant on whose bladder-like cheeks are shining deposits of jam, for the ensnaring of the dust in the air.  He offers a half-hearted caress in the direction of the moist and bedaubed countenance.  The woman does not deign an answer.

So there we are, trifling and grinning, like beggars whose plea still hangs fire.

Lamuse whispers to me, in a torment of fear and cupidity, “Let’s hope she’ll catch on, the filthy old slut.  It’s grand here, and, you know, everything else is pinched!”

“There’s no table,” the woman says at last.

“Don’t worry about the table,” Barque exclaims.  “Tenez! there, put away in that corner, the old door; that would make us a table.”

“You’re not going to trail me about and upset all my work!” replies the cardboard woman suspiciously, and with obvious regret that she had not chased us away immediately.

“Don’t worry, I tell you.  Look, I’ll show you.  Hey, Lamuse, old cock, give me a hand.”

Under the displeased glances of the virago we place the old door on a couple of barrels.

“With a bit of a rub-down,” says I, “that will be perfect.”

“Eh, oui, maman, a flick with a brush’ll do us instead of tablecloth.”

The woman hardly knows what to say; she watches us spitefully:  “There’s only two stools, and how many are there of you?”