You need have no further fears

"You need have no further fears. M. de Gartlauben, just is he was going away, promised me he would attend to your uncle's case, and although I shall not be here, my wife will keep an eye to it."

Since Madame Delaherche had made her appearance in the apartment Gilberte had not once taken her anxious eyes from off her face. Would she speak, would she tell what she had seen, and keep her son from starting on his projected journey? The elder lady, also, soon as she crossed the threshold, had bent her fixed gaze in silence on her daughter-in-law. Doubtless her stern patriotism induced her to view the matter in somewhat the same light that Henriette had viewed it. _Mon Dieu!_ since it was that young man, that Frenchman who had fought so bravely, was it not her duty to forgive, even as she had forgiven once before, in Captain Beaudoin's case,fake montblanc pens? A look of greater softness rose to her eyes; she averted her head. Her son might go; Edmond would be there to protect Gilberte against the Prussian,Moncler Outlet. She even smiled faintly, she whose grim face had never once relaxed since the news of the victory at Coulmiers.

"_Au revoir_," she said, folding her son in her arms. "Finish up your business quickly as you can and come back to us."

And she took herself slowly away, returning to the prison-like chamber across the corridor, where the colonel,fake uggs for sale, with his dull gaze, was peering into the shadows that lay outside the disk of bright light which fell from the lamp.

Henriette returned to Remilly that same evening, and one morning, three days afterward, had the pleasure to see Father Fouchard come walking into the house, as calmly as if he had merely stepped out to transact some business in the neighborhood,link. He took a seat by the table and refreshed himself with some bread and cheese, and to all the questions that were put to him replied with cool deliberation, like a man who had never seen anything to alarm him in his situation. What reason had he to be afraid? He had done nothing wrong; it was not he who had killed the Prussian, was it? So he had just said to the authorities: "Investigate the matter; I know nothing about it." And they could do nothing but release him, and the mayor as well, seeing they had no proofs against them. But the eyes of the crafty, sly old peasant gleamed with delight at the thought of how nicely he had pulled the wool over the eyes of those dirty blackguards, who were beginning to higgle with him over the quality of the meat he furnished to them.

December was drawing near its end, and Jean insisted on going away. His leg was quite strong again, and the doctor announced that he was fit to go and join the army. This was to Henriette a subject of profoundest sorrow, which she kept locked in her bosom as well as she was able. No tidings from Paris had reached them since the disastrous battle of Champigny; all they knew was that Maurice's regiment had been exposed to a murderous fire and had suffered severely. Ever that deep, unbroken silence; no letter, never the briefest line for them, when they knew that families in Raucourt and Sedan were receiving intelligence of their loved ones by circuitous ways. Perhaps the pigeon that was bringing them the so eagerly wished-for news had fallen a victim to some hungry bird of prey, perhaps the bullet of a Prussian had brought it to the ground at the margin of a wood. But the fear that haunted them most of all was that Maurice was dead; the silence of the great city off yonder in the distance, uttering no cry in the mortal hug of the investment, was become to them in their agonized suspense the silence of death. They had abandoned all hope of tidings, and when Jean declared his settled purpose to be gone, Henriette only gave utterance to this stifled cry of despair: