Virginia's frocks were hung under a shelf where there were three
dolls, some hoops, a doll-house, and a basin which she had used.
Félicité and Madame Aubain also took out the skirts, the
handkerchiefs, and the stockings and spread them on the beds,
before putting them away again. The sun fell on the piteous
things, disclosing their spots and the creases formed by the
motions of the body. The atmosphere was warm and blue, and a
blackbird trilled in the garden; everything seemed to live in
happiness. They found a little hat of soft brown plush, but it was
entirely moth-eaten. Félicité asked for it. Their eyes met and
filled with tears; at last the mistress opened her arms and the
servant threw herself against her breast and they hugged each
other and giving vent to their grief in a kiss which equalized
them for a moment.

It was the first time that this had ever happened, for Madame
Aubain was not of an expansive nature. Félicité was as grateful
for it as if it had been some favour, and thenceforth loved her
with animal-like devotion and a religious veneration.

Her kind-heartedness developed. When she heard the drums of a
marching regiment passing through the street, she would stand in
the doorway with a jug of cider and give the soldiers a drink. She
nursed cholera victims. She protected Polish refugees, and one of
them even declared that he wished to marry her. But they
quarrelled, for one morning when she returned from the Angelus she
found him in the kitchen coolly eating a dish which he had
prepared for himself during her absence.

After the Polish refugees, came Colmiche, an old man who was