“Monsieur,” replied the elder, “we have had nothing to eat since this morning.”
“So you have neither father nor mother?” resumed Gavroche majestically.
“Excuse us, sir, we have a papa and a mamma, but we don’t know where they are.”
“Sometimes that’s better than knowing where they are,” said Gavroche, who was a thinker.
“We have been wandering about these two hours,” continued the elder, “we have hunted for things at the corners of the streets, but we have found nothing.”
“I know,” ejaculated Gavroche, “it’s the dogs who eat everything.”
He went on, after a pause:—
“Ah! we have lost our authors. We don’t know what we have done with them. This should not be, gamins. It’s stupid to let old people stray off like that. Come now! we must have a snooze all the same.”
However, he asked them no questions. What was more simple than that they should have no dwelling place!
The elder of the two children, who had almost entirely recovered the prompt heedlessness of childhood, uttered this exclamation:—
“It’s queer, all the same. Mamma told us that she would take us to get a blessed spray on Palm Sunday.”
“Bosh,” said Gavroche.
“Mamma,” resumed the elder, “is a lady who lives with Mamselle Miss.”