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--not more than you think yourself; for, look here, you've only
forked out six bits of sugar. I want eight."

"What's all this, Nanon? I have never seen you like this before. What
have you got in your head? Are you the mistress here? You sha'n't have
more than six pieces of sugar."

"Well, then, how is your nephew to sweeten his coffee?"

"With two pieces; I'll go without myself."

"Go without sugar at your age! I'd rather buy you some out of my own
pocket."

"Mind your own business."

In spite of the recent fall in prices, sugar was still in Grandet's
eyes the most valuable of all the colonial products; to him it was
always six francs a pound. The necessity of economizing it, acquired
under the Empire, had grown to be the most inveterate of his habits.
All women, even the greatest ninnies, know how to dodge and dodge to
get their ends; Nanon abandoned the sugar for the sake of getting the
_galette_.

"Mademoiselle!" she called through the window, "do you want some
_galette_?"

"No, no," answered Eugenie.

"Come, Nanon," said Grandet, hearing his daughter's voice. "See here."
He opened the cupboard where the flour was kept, gave her a cupful,
and added a few ounces of butter to the piece he had already cut off.

"I shall want wood for the oven," said the implacable Nanon.

"Well, take what you want," he answered sadly; "but in that case you
must make us a fruit-tart, and you'll cook the whole dinner in the
oven. In that way you won't need two fires."

"Goodness!" cried Nanon, "you needn't tell me that."

Grandet cast a look that was well-nigh paternal upon his faithful
deputy.

"Mademoiselle," she cried, when his back was turned, "we shall have
the _galette_."

Pere Grandet returned from the garden with the fruit and arranged a
plateful on the kitchen-table.

"Just see, monsieur," said Nanon, "what pretty boots your nephew has.
What leather! why it smells good! What does he clean it with, I
wonder? Am I to put your egg-polish on it?"

"Nanon, I think eggs would injure that kind of leather. Tell him you
don't know how to black morocco; yes, that's morocco. He will get you
something himself in Saumur to polish those boots with. I have heard
that they put sugar into the blacking to make it shine."

"They look good to eat," said the cook, putting the boots to her nose.
"Bless me! if they don't smell like madame's eau-de-cologne. Ah! how
funny!"

"Funny!" said her master. "Do you call it funny to put more money into
boots than the man who stands in them is worth?"

"Monsieur," she said, when Grandet returned the second time, after
locking the fruit-garden, "won't you have the _pot-au-feu_ put on once
or twice a week on account of your nephew?"

"Yes."

"Am I to go to the butcher's?"

"Certainly not. We will make the broth of fowls; the farmers will
bring them. I shall tell Cornoiller to shoot some crows; they make the

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