rank," Dumay said, "speaks to Modeste, ogles her, makes love to her,
he is a dead man. I'll blow his brains out and give myself to the
authorities; my death may save her. If you don't wish to see my head
cut off, do you take my place in watching her when I am obliged to go
out."

For the last three years Dumay had examined his pistols every night.
He seemed to have put half the burden of his oath upon the Pyrenean
hounds, two animals of uncommon sagacity. One slept inside the Chalet,
the other was stationed in a kennel which he never left, and where he
never barked; but terrible would have been the moment had the pair
made their teeth meet in some unknown adventurer.

We can now imagine the sort of life led by mother and daughter at the
Chalet. Monsieur and Madame Latournelle, often accompanied by
Gobenheim, came to call and play whist with Dumay nearly every
evening. The conversation turned on the gossip of Havre and the petty
events of provincial life. The little company separated between nine
and ten o'clock. Modeste put her mother to bed, and together they said
their prayers, kept up each other's courage, and talked of the dear
absent one, the husband and father. After kissing her mother for
good-night, the girl went to her own room about ten o'clock. The next
morning she prepared her mother for the day with the same care, the
same prayers, the same prattle. To her praise be it said that from the
day when the terrible infirmity deprived her mother of a sense,
Modeste had been like a servant to her, displaying at all times the
same solicitude; never wearying of the duty, never thinking it
monotonous. Such constant devotion, combined with a tenderness rare
among young girls, was thoroughly appreciated by those who witnessed
it. To the Latournelle family, and to Monsieur and Madame Dumay,