The morning of his final departure he contrived to meet, as it were accidentally, Courtecuisse, the only keeper then employed at Les Aigues, the great extent of which really needed at least three.
“Well, Monsieur Gaubertin,” said Courtecuisse, “so you have had trouble with the count?”
“Who told you that?” answered Gaubertin. “Well, yes; the general expected to order us about as he did his cavalry; he didn’t know Burgundians. The count is not satisfied with my services, and as I am not satisfied with his ways, we have dismissed each other, almost with fisticuffs, for he raged like a whirlwind. Take care of yourself, Courtecuisse! Ah! my dear fellow, I expected to give you a better master.”
“I know that,” said the keeper, “and I’d have served you well. Hang it, when friends have known each other for twenty years, you know! You put me here in the days of the poor dear sainted Madame. Ah, what a good woman she was! none like her now! The place has lost a mother.”
“Look here, Courtecuisse, if you are willing, you might help us to a fine stroke.”
“Then you are going to stay here? I heard you were off to Paris.”
“No; I shall wait to see how things turn out; meantime I shall do business at Ville-aux-Fayes. The general doesn’t know what he is dealing with in these parts; he’ll make himself hated, don’t you see? I shall wait for what turns up. Do your work here gently; he’ll tell you to manage the people with a high hand, for he begins to see where his crops and his woods are running to; but you’ll not be such a fool as to let the country-folk maul you, and perhaps worse, for the sake of his timber.”
“But he would send me away, dear Monsieur Gaubertin, he would get rid of me! and you know how happy I am living there at the gate of the Avonne.”
“The general will soon get sick of the whole place,” replied Gaubertin; “you wouldn’t be long out even if he did happen to send you away. Besides, you know those woods,” he added, waving his hand at the landscape; “I am stronger there than the masters.”
This conversation took place in an open field.
“Those ‘Arminac’ Parisian fellows ought to stay in their own mud,” said the keeper.
Ever since the quarrels of the fifteenth century the word ‘Arminac’ (Armagnacs, Parisians, enemies of the Dukes of Burgundy) has continued to be an insulting term along the borders of Upper Burgundy, where it is differently corrupted according to locality.