Antoine treated his mother yet more harshly that evening.  Not knowing on whom else to wreak his vengeance, he repeated his accusation of the previous day; he kept the wretched woman up till midnight, trembling with shame and fright.  Adelaide having informed him that Pierre made her an allowance, he now felt certain that his brother had pocketed the fifty thousand francs.  But, in his irritation, he still affected to doubt it, and did not cease to question the poor woman, again and again reproaching her with misconduct.

Antoine soon found out that, alone and without resources, he could not successfully carry on a contest with his brother.  He then endeavoured to gain Adelaide to his cause; an accusation lodged by her might have serious consequences.  But, at Antoine’s first suggestion of it, the poor, lazy, lethargic creature firmly refused to bring trouble on her eldest son.

“I am an unhappy woman,” she stammered; “it is quite right of you to get angry.  But I should feel too much remorse if I caused one of my sons to be sent to prison.  No; I’d rather let you beat me.”

He saw that he would get nothing but tears out of her, and contented himself with saying that she was justly punished, and that he had no pity for her.  In the evening, upset by the continual quarrels which her son had sought with her, Adelaide had one of those nervous attacks which kept her as rigid as if she had been dead.  The young man threw her on her bed, and then began to rummage the house to see if the wretched woman had any savings hidden away.  He found about forty francs.  He took possession of them, and, while his mother still lay there, rigid and scarce able to breathe, he quietly took the diligence to Marseilles.

He had just bethought himself that Mouret, the journeyman hatter who had married his sister Ursule, must be indignant at Pierre’s roguery, and would no doubt be willing to defend his wife’s interests.  But he did not find in him the man he expected.  Mouret plainly told him that he had become accustomed to look upon Ursule as an orphan, and would have no contentions with her family at any price.  Their affairs were prospering.  Antoine was received so coldly that he hastened to take the diligence home again.  But, before leaving, he was anxious to revenge himself for the secret contempt which he read in the workman’s eyes; and, observing that his sister appeared rather pale and dejected, he said to her husband, in a slyly cruel way, as he took his departure:  “Have a care, my sister was always sickly, and I find her much changed for the worse; you may lose her altogether.”

The tears which rushed to Mouret’s eyes convinced him that he had touched a sore wound.  But then those work-people made too great a display of their happiness.