CHAPTER V.
THE MOTHER AND SON.Unaware of the evil designs of his family, Martial entered the kitchen slowly.
Some few words let fall by La Louve in her conversation with Fleur-de-Marie have already acquainted the reader with the singular existence of this man. Endowed with excellent natural instincts, incapable of an action positively base or wicked, Martial did not, however, lead a regular life: he poached on the water; but his strength and his boldness inspired so much fear that the keepers of the river shut their eyes on this irregularity.
To this illegal occupation Martial joined another that was equally illicit. A redoubtable champion, he willingly undertook—and more from excess of courage, from love of the thing, than for gain—to avenge in pugilistic or single-stick encounters tho
