"Without doubt! I, who lived on black bread, I make four good meals a day. I had a wretched blouse, full of holes, and patched trousers, and now I am dressed like a prince. I suffer no more from cold, and, instead of lying out under the stars, I go to sleep every night in a comfortable bed, where I dream of gingerbread and fruit-cake."
Father Lustucru rested his chin on the palm of his right hand, and fixing his piercing eyes upon Faribole, said to him:--
"Suppose you were obliged to take up again with the vagabond life from which I lifted you?"
"Then you would do anything to preserve your present position?"
"Very well. Now, this is what I demand of you imperatively: Moumouth follows you willingly; to-morrow, just at night-fall, you will lead him into the garden; you will put him into a sack which I have made expressly, and tightly draw the cords of the sack"--
"And then?" said Faribole, who opened his eyes wide.
"We will each arm us with a stick, and we will beat upon the sack until he is dead."
"Never! never!" cried the poor boy, whose hair stood up with fright.
"Then pack your bundle quickly, and be off; I turn you away!"
"You turn me away!" repeated young Faribole, lifting up his hands to the sky.
"I do not give you five minutes to be gone; you depend upon me here, solely on me."
The unhappy Faribole began to weep, and the steward added, in a savage voice,--
"Come, now! no faces! Take off your clothes, and put on your rags, and disappear!"
Having pronounced these words, Lustucru took from a closet the miserable vestments which Faribole had worn the day of his installation. The steward seized them disdainfully between his thumb and forefinger, and threw them upon the floor.
The boy looked with an air of despair at the habits he had on, compared them with those which he was obliged to resume, and the comparison was so little to the advantage of the latter, that he broke into loud sobs.
However, he was decided not to purchase handsome clothes at the price of a perfidy and a horrible murder. He resolutely threw off his vest, then his neckerchief; but at the idea of giving up his new shoes, of walking barefoot, as formerly, over roads paved with gravel and broken glass, the luckless Faribole had a moment of hesitation.