Roland had risen.
"And would you wish, my dear sir, that my son should at once sign his acceptance?"
"Nono, M. Roland. To-morrow, at my office to-morrow, at two o'clock, if that suits you."
"Yes, to be sureyes, indeed. I should think so."
Then Mme. Roland, who had also risen and who was smiling after her tears, went up to the lawyer, and laying her hand on the back of his chair while she looked at him with the pathetic eyes of a grateful mother, she said:
"And now for that cup of tea, Monsieur Lecanu?"
"Now I will accept it with pleasure, madame."
The maid, on being summoned, brought in first some dry biscuits in deep tin boxes, those crisp, insipid English cakes which seem to have been made for a parrot's beak, and soldered into metal cases for a voyage round the world. Next she fetched some little gray linen doilies, folded square, those tea-napkins which in thrifty families never get washed. A third time she came in with the sugar-basin and cups; then she departed to heat the water. They sat waiting.
No one could talk; they had too much to think about and nothing to say. Mme. Roland
32
