Chapter XXXI: April 20th

... Very early yesterday morning Yzore was carried away under a covering of quick-lime: the children do not know; Manm-Robert took heed they should not see. They have been told their mother has been taken to the country to get well,--that the doctor will bring her back soon.... All the furniture is to be sold at auction to pay the debts;--the landlord was patient, he waited four months; the doctor was kindly: but now these must have their due. Everything will be bidden off, except the chapelle, with its Virgin and angels of porcelain: _yo pa ka pè venne Bon-Dié_ (the things of the Good-God must not be sold). And Manm-Robert will take care of the little ones.

The bed--a relic of former good-fortune,--a great Martinique bed of carved heavy native wood,--_a lit-à-bateau_ (boat-bed), so called because shaped almost like a barge, perhaps--will surely bring three hundred francs;--the armoire, with its mirror doors, not less than two hundred and fifty. There is little else of value: the whole will not fetch enough to pay all the dead owes.