December had come and wrapped the city in a winding-sheet of snow; the cruel news seemed all the bitterer for the piercing cold.  After General Ducrot’s repulse at Champigny, after the loss of Orleans, there was left but one dark, sullen hope:  that the soil of France might avenge their defeat, exterminate and swallow up the victors.  Let the snow fall thicker and thicker still, let the earth’s crust crack and open under the biting frost, that in it the entire German nation might find a grave!  And there came another sorrow to wring poor Madame Delaherche’s heart.  One night when her son was from home, having been suddenly called away to Belgium on business, chancing to pass Gilberte’s door she heard within a low murmur of voices and smothered laughter.  Disgusted and sick at heart she returned to her own room, where her horror of the abominable thing she suspected the existence of would not let her sleep:  it could have been none other but the Prussian whose voice she heard; she had thought she had noticed glances of intelligence passing; she was prostrated by this supreme disgrace.  Ah, that woman, that abandoned woman, whom her son had insisted on bringing to the house despite her commands and prayers, whom she had forgiven, by her silence, after Captain Beaudoin’s death!  And now the thing was repeated, and this time the infamy was even worse.  What was she to do?  Such an enormity must not go unpunished beneath her roof.  Her mind was torn by the conflict that raged there, in her uncertainty as to the course she should pursue.  The colonel, desiring to know nothing of what occurred outside his room, always checked her with a gesture when he thought she was about to give him any piece of news, and she had said nothing to him of the matter that had caused her such suffering; but on those days when she came to him with tears standing in her eyes and sat for hours in mournful silence, he would look at her and say to himself that France had sustained yet another defeat.

This was the condition of affairs in the house in the Rue Maqua when Henriette dropped in there one morning to endeavor to secure Delaherche’s influence in favor of Father Fouchard.  She had heard people speak, smiling significantly as they did so, of the servitude to which Gilberte had reduced Captain de Gartlauben; she was, therefore, somewhat embarrassed when she encountered old Madame Delaherche, to whom she thought it her duty to explain the object of her visit, ascending the great staircase on her way to the colonel’s apartment.

“Dear madame, it would be so kind of you to assist us!  My uncle is in great danger; they talk of sending him away to Germany.”

The old lady, although she had a sincere affection for Henriette, could scarce conceal her anger as she replied: 

“I am powerless to help you, my child; you should not apply to me.”  And she continued, notwithstanding the agitation on the other’s face:  “You have selected an unfortunate moment for your visit; my son has to go to Belgium to-night.  Besides, he could not have helped you; he has no more influence than I have.  Go to my daughter-in-law; she is all powerful.”