She welcomed me, and I went into the hall, where three children, ranged according to their height, seemed set out for review, like firemen before a mayor, and I said: "Ah! ah! so these are the others?" And Simon, who was radiant with pleasure, named them: "Jean, Sophie and Gontran."
The door of the drawing-room was open. I went in and in the depths of an easy-chair I saw something trembling, a man, an old, paralyzed man. Madame Radevin came forward and said: "This is my grandfather, Monsieur; he is eighty-seven." And then she shouted into the shaking old man's ears: "This is a friend of Simon's, papa." The old gentleman tried to say "good day" to me, and he muttered: "Oua, oua, oua," and waved his hand, and I took a seat, saying: "You are very kind, Monsieur."
Simon had just come in, and he said with a laugh: "So! You have made grandpapa's acquaintance. He is priceless, is that old man; he is the delight of the children, and he is so greedy that he almost kills himself at every meal; you have no idea what he would eat if he were allowed to do as he pleased. But you will see, you will see. He likes all the sweets as if they were so many girls. You have never seen anything funnier; you will see it presently."
I was then shown to my room to change my dress for dinner, and hearing a great clatter behind me on the stairs, I turned round and saw that all the children were following me behind their father; to do me honor, no doubt.
My windows looked out onto a plain, bare, interminable plain, an ocean of grass, of wheat, and of oats, without a clump of trees or any rising ground, a striking and melancholy picture of the life which they must be leading in that house.
A bell rang; it was for dinner, and so I went downstairs. Madame Radevin took my arm in a ceremonious manner, and we went into the dining-room. A footman wheeled in the old man's armchair, who gave a greedy and curious look at the dessert, as he with difficulty turned his shaking head from one dish to the other.
Simon rubbed his hands: "You will be amused," he said; and all the children understood that I was going to be indulged with the sight of their greedy grandfather, and they began to laugh accordingly, while their mother merely smiled and shrugged her shoulders, and Simon, making a speaking trumpet of his hands, shouted at the old man: "This evening there is sweet rice cream," and the wrinkled face of the grandfather brightened, and he trembled more violently all over, showing that he had understood and was very pleased. The dinner began.