"Since then, I have received another letter, a few months ago, in which she told me that her husband was dead and that she was on her way to me with all the money she owed me."
"Well?"
"Nothing but lies! Nobody came. Do people like that come and pay back the money they have stolen! No, they were a couple of thieves. You ask anybody at Domfront about M. and Mme. Despriol: a nice reputation they left behind them! If either of them thought of coming back here, they'd be stoned in the streets! Henriette indeed! Why, I should spit in her face, that I would, the sneak, the hypocrite! ..."
She uttered those words with an accent of implacable hatred charged with all the rancour of those fifteen years of poverty and privation. Gilberte shuddered. The evil expression on that face filled her with a sort of repugnance. Nevertheless, she took
