She ran to the children, clutched an arm of each child, bundled them
into the room, and carefully closed the door of her storeroom of
plenty. But she did not take their prunes away from them.

"Now, then, be good, my pets! If one did not look after them," she
went on, looking at Genestas, "they would eat up the whole lot of
prunes, the madcaps!"

Then she seated herself on a three-legged stool, drew the little
weakling between her knees, and began to comb and wash his head with a
woman's skill and with motherly assiduity. The four small thieves hung
about. Some of them stood, others leant against the bed or the
bread-hutch. They gnawed their prunes without saying a word, but they
kept their sly and mischievous eyes fixed upon the stranger. In spite
of grimy countenances and noses that stood in need of wiping, they all
looked strong and healthy.

"Are they your children?" the soldier asked the old woman.

"Asking your pardon, sir, they are charity children. They give me
three francs a month and a pound's weight of soap for each of them."

"But it must cost you twice as much as that to keep them, good woman?"

"That is just what M. Benassis tells me, sir; but if other folk will
board the children for the same money, one has to make it do. Nobody
wants the children, but for all that there is a good deal of
performance to go through before they will let us have them. When the
milk we give them comes to nothing, they cost us scarcely anything.
Besides that, three francs is a great deal, sir; there are fifteen