NOBODY'S BOY (Sans Famille) - Hector Malot

[Chap IV - VI]

CHAPTER IV

THE MATERNAL HOUSE

"Well," asked Mother Barberin, when we entered, "what did the mayor

say?"

"We didn't see him."

"How! You didn't see him?"

"No, I met some friends at the Notre-Dame cafe and when we came out it

was too late. So we'll go back to-morrow."

So Barberin had given up the idea of driving a bargain with the man with

the dogs.

On the way home I wondered if this was not some trick of his, returning

to the house, but his last words drove all my doubts away. As we had to

go back to the village the next day to see the mayor, it was certain

that Barberin had not accepted Vitalis' terms.

But in spite of his threats I would have spoken of my fears to Mother

Barberin if I could have found myself alone for one moment with her, but

all the evening Barberin did not leave the house, and I went to bed

without getting the opportunity. I went to sleep thinking that I would

tell her the next day. But the next day when I got up, I did not see

her. As I was running all round the house looking for her, Barberin saw

me and asked me what I wanted.

"Mamma."

"She has gone to the village and won't be back till this afternoon."

She had not told me the night before that she was going to the village,

and without knowing why, I began to feel anxious. Why didn't she wait

for us, if we were going in the afternoon? Would she be back before we

started? Without knowing quite why, I began to feel very frightened, and

Barberin looked at me in a way that did not tend to reassure me. To

escape from his look I ran into the garden.

Our garden meant a great deal to us. In it we grew almost all that we

ate--potatoes, cabbages, carrots, turnips. There was no ground wasted,

yet Mother Barberin had given me a little patch all to myself, in which

I had planted ferns and herbs that I had pulled up in the lanes while I

was minding the cow. I had planted everything pell mell, one beside the

other, in my bit of garden: it was not beautiful, but I loved it. It was

mine. I arranged it as I wished, just as I felt at the time, and when I

spoke of it, which happened twenty times a day, it was "My garden."

Already the jonquils were in bud and the lilac was beginning to shoot,

and the wall flowers would soon be out. How would they bloom? I

wondered, and that was why I came to see them every day. But there was

another part of my garden that I studied with great anxiety. I had

planted a vegetable that some one had given to me and which was almost