M. RAINDAL reached the station fifteen minutes before the departure of the train which was to take him to Les Frettes. He paced the platform, thinking.

Most of the carriages were empty. On the deserted platform he saw not a porter, not a truck; it stretched out, an endless carpet of asphalt. The glass roof refracted a dark, heavy heat. It was that hour of semi-rest, between the end of morning and the beginning of afternoon, when everything seems to be dozing in the railway stations, apart from the engines, the men, the wagons and the goods.

M. Raindal walked with his head down, his hands clasped behind his back, his big white panama hat set slightly at the back of his head. One by one he recalled the previous days, the painful ten days’ siege from which he had come out at last victorious, although confused, worn-out and wounded. At times he sighed at the thought of it.

The week had surely been a painful one! Twenty meals of sulky silence, shifty glances and contrite looks! In between, never a word; a speechless war of resistances which clashed without coming to a close contact; a strained parody of ease in the midst of utter discomfort. Then, on the eve of his departure, one hour before the women were to leave for Langrune, the last battle had been fought: ThÉrÈse and Mme. Raindal had abdicated all pride, affectionately begged M. Raindal to follow them, and attempted to give him a supreme counsel. A little more and he would have given way. His refusals were softened; the chains of his promise were breaking apart. A careless admission on the part of ThÉrÈse had changed the issue of the battle.

“Well, I admit it, father!” she had said in answer to the maste charge. “We might, after all, have shown ourselves less openly hostile to Mme. Chambannes, less cold perhaps when you described her receptions to us.”

That admission had moved him to a new resentment, bringing back an angry memory of all their previous malice.

“Ha! you acknowledge it now!” he exclaimed. “Now that you see me firm in my decision, now that you realize the extent of your faults.... And you wish me to add to those one more discourtesy, you want me to break my word to Mme. Chambannes who is waiting for me.... Too late! You should have thought of all this sooner.”

He had gone on mumbling indistinct and vindictive recriminations. Intimate arguments supported him. What if he were to listen to these two women—would it not mean that the same thing would have to be gone through again on his return? No, they stood in need of a little lesson, of an exemplary warning!... Brigitte had closed the debate when she came in to announce the arrival of the carriage from the station. They had exchanged icy kisses from the tips of their lips, with hurried promises to write every week and to meet again in September. The door had banged. The sound of heavy wheels came from the street. M. Raindal had been left alone, delivered, saved from going to Langrune.

Still walking up and down, the master sighed. He had now no great illusion concerning the seriousness of that parting. How many mÉnages survived such outbursts! The malice of outsiders took a share in them and exasperated the disagreements. Grievances were sharpened by distance and were sharper on return; when people met again, they were almost enemies.

Why! Should he have submitted to the tyranny which his wife and daughter tried to impose upon him? Should he have sacrificed a precious sympathy, an exceptional friendship, to their envy and prejudice? Ought he to have blindly bent himself to their orders, as if he were repenting of some guilt, instead of opposing them with the firmness of his innocence?

“Passengers for Mantes, Maisons—Lafitte, Poissy, Villedouillet, les Mureaux, take your seats!” proclaimed a guard.

M. Raindal climbed into a carriage. An old attendant closed the door after him. The master noticed in the man a likeness to Uncle Cyprien. He grunted:

“Another one who will not bother me any more!”

He settled in a corner of the carriage, took off his hat, his relaxed frame all ready for a doze. The thought of Cyprien kept him awake a few minutes. He had, until the last minutes, dreaded his brothe lectures, anathemas and curses. But no such outbursts had come. On the eve of his departure, Cyprien had dined with them and expressed no violent opinion whatsoever on hearing from the maste own lips of the dual vacation which was to split the family. All he had done was to risk a harmless jest: “So then, my friends, you are to be bifurcated! Bah! If it suits your taste.... It does rest one, after seeing each other all the year round.”

He had seemed almost ill at ease, kept his eyes on his plate and only reassumed his good humor when they had left the table.... A queer fellow, Cyprien, a foamy brain, any suspicion on his part was out of the question.

This contemptuous judgment fully satisfied the master. He gradually fell into slumber and did not wake up until he reached Villedouillet station.

Mme. Chambannes was on the platform, wearing a dress of batiste, embroidered with pink flowers, and white kid shoes. She waved to him with her sunshade, then followed the train until it came to a stop. Standing at the entrance of his carriage, she smiled at the master as he climbed down the stiff steps.

“So your wife and daughter did not want to come?” she asked maliciously, after the first words of greetings had been exchanged.

“No, my dear friend! I could not persuade them.... Besides, I did insist very much.... The sea air is very good for ThÉrÈse.”

“They must hate me! You must admit it!”

M. Raindal blushed and affected to chuckle.

“Well, well! I would not like to say that this departure took place without some objections on both sides.... These two women have their own views ... and I have mine.... You know, they do always coincide.”

Then he added more boastfully:

“However, they are in the habit of respecting my will and, after all, the parting was better than I had feared, despite the regrettable scene which I mentioned briefly to you in Paris.... At all events, here I am.... Is that the only thing that matters?”

There was a pause. ZozÉ, a sarcastic and thoughtful expression on her face, stood outside the station. A yellow-painted governess carriage, with a bay pony, its mane close-clipped, stood against the curb. Firmin, who stood at the head of the pony, discreetly greeted the master.

“Here, Firmin!” said Mme. Chambannes. “Keep M. Rainda check.... You will look after his luggage and bring it along in the trap I ordered from the livery man.”

She settled herself in the carriage, sitting sidewise, facing the tail of the horse. She took up the reins. The master sat opposite her. ZozÉ caressed the flanks of the pony with a light touch of her whip. The carriage ran down the inclined station-yard, pitching at the shock of the uneven stones. A few lookers-on stood on the edge of the pavement and smiled half-jeeringly as they watched it go.

In less than fifteen minutes the carriage entered the graveled avenue which led to the front steps of Les Frettes. Trees made a frame on each side of it; suddenly the house appeared. It was a large modern building with white walls broken at two or three windows by brown blinds.

There was a wide lawn in front with beds of roses, dahlias and mixed phlox in the corners. Behind, the park began at once. It was dark, thick-leaved, endless apparently, and ran for a long distance alongside the state road separated from it by a wall.

Right and left of the house, more trees linked their branches, hiding the country beyond, forming a thick enclosure as far as the back of the building, around another lawn which was like a little field and contained a tennis court with the net hanging slack. To “enjoy the view,” as Mme. Chambannes said, one had to go up to the second floor.

“Your room is on that floor, dear master, and on the side looking right over the tennis lawn.... A superb view, as you will see.”

M. Raindal followed her up the stairs, which were filled with an odor of iris.

ZozÉ pushed the window open. A great gust of soft wind entered. The master leaned on the balcony and for a long time contemplated the scenery.

Beyond the trees began the immensity of the apparently limitless lower plain. The villages with their belfries seemed like so many topographic points marked, as on a map, with childish signs. To the left, the little hills opposite curved their slopes in a chess-board effect of yellow, brown and green vegetation. At the bottom one could not see but one could guess the presence of the Seine river, a loop of which sparkled like a pruning-hook.

“Is it pretty?” said Mme. Chambannes who, with her plump elbow, touched that of the master on the railing of the balcony.

“Very beautiful!” declared the master.

And he murmured, turning his glance to ZozÉ:

“I am very happy, my dear friend, very happy to be near you!”

She thanked him with a candid smile on her profile. In this full light, the clearness of her complexion was enlivened. It showed subtle shades finely superposed in a diaphanous blend. The light of day penetrated her batiste blouse and a pale rose reflection breathed under the material. M. Raindal was enumerating all these charms to himself. Unwittingly, he was little by little pressing his elbow against that of the young woman. He was even going to seize the hand of his little pupil—always a perilous operation which he never risked unless moved by a sudden audacious impulse—but the door was unexpectedly opened.

Aunt Panhias entered, escorted by a servant who carried M. Rainda trunk on his shoulder.

From that time, until the next morning, the master and ZozÉ were never alone. When the trunk was opened, visits began: Mme. Herschstein, Mme. Silberschmidt, with one of her cousins from Breslau, and, at five, the abbÉ Touronde.

They all gathered at that time, in the shelter of a shady glade which opened on the park, not far from the entrance and on the side of the main path. It was surrounded with lime trees and forest trees not yet grown to their full height. In the center of this circular space stood a mushroom-shaped stone table. Tea was brought in, with cakes and iced fruit in champagne which ZozÉ served with a small gilt ladle.

The women sat in comfortable reed armchairs which presented this inconvenience, however, that they squeaked under the weight of people who were too heavy. M. Raindal preferred a strong rocking-chair, the balancing of which amused him.

The conversation was kept up, light and easy, until the return of Uncle Panhias who came back from Paris about 6.30. The abbÉ Touronde, as he left, secured the maste promise that he would come and visit his orphanage in the course of the week.

When the dinner was finished, M. Raindal asked leave to retire. He was, he said, tired out by this first day of settling down. Mme. Chambannes encouraged him to go and rest.

He inspected his room, however, before going to bed. Everything had been arranged with a perfect refinement of country elegance: from the furniture of ash-wood with copper handles to the bed and window curtains of English cretonne and the sachets of lavender scattered about the drawers and on the shelves of the mirrored wardrobe.

The bedclothes smelt of iris, a coarser iris, but more wholesome than that personally used by ZozÉ. M. Raindal sniffed persistently at this unusual scent which bathed his body; then he blew out his candle.

He was going to sleep. The sound of footsteps above caused him to open his eyes in spite of the utter darkness about him. Who was it? His little pupil, his dear friend? What a flattering and rare pleasure it was to sleep under the same roof with her! The master tossed about several times in his bed. A thousand tempestuous and uncertain images showed ZozÉ to him. He sighed and grew impatient in this captivating sleeplessness. The fresh air, very likely, the stimulation of the fresh air! At last, he made up his mind about it. Lying on his back, he contemplated, without resisting them, the procession of his feverish reveries. They were beginning to assume a more distinct shape than was altogether seemly when fortunately sleep came and swept them all away.

The next morning, about ten, Mme. Chambannes proposed a ride to the master. They left the house, with Anselme, the coachman, who sat, despite the bumps of the road, stiff and respectful, in the corner of the little carriage, near the case destined for umbrellas.

The morning was clear and fresh, of that August freshness, still cool between the previous da heat and that of the coming hours, but a summer freshness all the same, reassuring and with no chilly signs of any forthcoming cold spell.

ZozÉ drove with high hands, her eyes free, turning aside according to the conversation, while the pony trotted with all its speed, swinging his back.

Twenty minutes later, they reached the road which climbed under trees towards the tiny forest of Verneuil. Instinctively, the pony slowed its pace. Huge horse-flies scattered under its feet, others stuck greedily to its neck and its fat shiny flanks.

The wood showed a diversity of the most harmonious colors. Broken by daylight here and there, it would seem all white with rows of slender silver birches. Further on were spaces that were wholly pink, invaded by the wild briar. A dark mass of pines dominated everything, clarified only by the growth of the young, light green, pine-needles. The wind had scattered many of the older ones and they lay drying in the dust.

On returning, they stopped by the side of the road which cut the wood. Anselme spread out a rug on the ground, and the master sat there with Mme. Chambannes. ZozÉ apologized for taking out her cigarette-case. In the country, etiquette might be relaxed, might it not? And then they were in a little wood where they could meet no one.

Hardly had she said this when two young cyclists appeared. They were pedaling in a leisurely way, side by side. At once, M. Raindal angrily recalled his intolerant brother Cyprien.

The two young men winked slyly at each other, indicating ZozÉ. “Pretty!” the nearer of the two said distinctly.

This familiar remark further provoked M. Raindal.

“Cad!” he said, when the two cyclists had passed on.

“Why?” asked ZozÉ, blowing out her smoke. “One must not take offense for so little, in the country.”

Those three words constituted her favorite motto at Les Frettes, a permanent justification for all the fantasies of dress and behavior which her gloom and her idleness invented.

She took advantage of it, the next morning, to dispense with Anselm services for their ride. The coachma presence had obviously paralyzed M. Raindal.

“A very good idea!” the master said approvingly, as soon as they had started. “Besides he was of no use at all, that fellow.”

Thereupon he seized his little pupi hand so brusquely and violently that Notpou—such was the almost Egyptian-sounding name which Mme. Chambannes had bestowed upon her pony—shied with fear, under the pain from his suddenly pulled bit.

“You must keep quiet, dear master?” ZozÉ chided, as she brought the animal back to its pace. “You are scaring Notpou.... Yol have us tipped over!”

“It was such a long time!” M. Raindal stammered.

She smiled indulgently. Suddenly emboldened, the master asked, in the absent-minded tone he used on such occasions:

“And the Messrs. de Meuze?... Did you have any news from them?”

Mme. Chambannes replied, making an effort to repress the blood she felt rushing to her face:

“None!... I believe that they are at Deauville until the end of the month, as I told you last week.... They were to arrive there the day before I left Paris.”

M. Raindal, his hands hanging, directed a studious look at her.

“In that case, they are not coming here?”

“Not that I know of, during August,” ZozÉ replied, having almost conquered her blush. “After that, it will be the shooting season.... So ... you see!”

“Quite!” the master murmured, while in his heart he ragingly abused ThÉrÈse.

Ah! how he wished she were here, for an instant only, so that she could hear this! That was the way people made accusations and spread calumny, without proofs, acting upon suspicions and uncertain jealousies! “A woman who publicly gave herself a lover!” M. Raindal repeated to himself. Publicly! A lover! Where?... At Deauville, perhaps! (For, gradually, the master had narrowed down his suspicions and centered their watchfulness upon the head of Gerald, the only young man, after all, whom Mme. Chambannes saw frequently.) Yes! At Deauville, fifty leagues from Les Frettes, neglecting his love affair for a month and even more! A fine lover indeed!... How mean and unfair people were! He let out a contemptuous laugh.

“Are you laughing, dear master?” Mme. Chambannes inquired.

“I am laughing,” he replied between two kisses, “I am laughing at the wickedness, or more exactly at the stupidity of mankind!”

The daily schedule soon became regular. Whenever the heat did not prevent it, the morning was spent in driving.

They eschewed the fashionable places beyond Poissy, in the neighborhood of Saint Germain. They preferred to follow the course of the Seine, driving towards Poutoise or even Mantes, an uneven, hilly and often imposing region which attracted the master, as it had Mme. Chambannes.

There the wind rolled its ample currents over plateaux and hills, carrying a strong taste reminiscent of the sea. Sometimes, at the top of a shut-in road that climbed under the shady trees, an unexpected perspective disclosed enormous expanses, forests, cross-roads, the breadth of the river, a big village, oxen in a field, vine on a hill-side, in short, the whole unexpected complexity of the provincial countryside, far from Paris and its suburbs.

The master and Mme. Chambannes would leave about nine and not return until time for lunch. Some days, in order to prevent idle gossip, they took the abbÉ Touronde with them. M. Raindal and the priest occupied one seat and ZozÉ, who was driving, the other.

One Thursday, the three of them went as far as Mantes, where the master wished to purchase a pair of brown shoes; their arrival caused a sensation. The strange carriage, the piquant attractiveness of Mme. Chambannes, M. Rainda white hair and the black robe of the abbÉ impressed the curious with their cumulative effect. In front of the bootmake shop, urchins surrounded the carriage. Neighboring shopkeepers came out on their steps and passed jocular comments. This affair and the popular emotion it caused were summed up in a short anonymous paragraph in the Petit Impartial de Seine-et-Oise. Although names were not given no one could mistake the meaning of the allusions, from the heading, Suzanne, to the bitterness of the writer towards “certain ecclesiastics, friends of the orphans” who were paying for the abbÉ Tourond holidays.

As a result of this unlucky experience Mme. Chambannes henceforth avoided the towns.

These drives, moreover, were less of a pleasure than a mere pastime between the hours when she read Geral letters—when any came—and those when she wrote to him.

Every day, after lunch, she shut herself up, to write him long pages, cleverly composed so as to stimulate his inert tenderness and his somnolent jealousy. In the meantime, M. Raindal, who had gone up, seemingly to work, enjoyed a nap on the floor above or imitated his hostess by writing a few words to his family. It would have made a piquant comparison to put their two letters side by side. ZozÉ purposely blackened her own character, multiplied the questionable details, the recital of episodes where her coquetry won her admiration, the masculine homage, the fervent glances of M. Raindal, of the abbÉ, of a passer-by, of all the men. The master, on the contrary, exhausted all examples in order to whitewash her of everything suspicious, to establish her child-like candor, her virtue and undoubted purity.

They did not meet again until nearly four lock. Then, according to the temperature, they remained in the garden or made visits in the neighborhood, either to the abbÉ Touronde, whose little orphans M. Raindal inspected twice, the Herschsteins, or the Silberschmidts.

Never did the time lag for the master, unless it were when ZozÉ left him alone with her Aunt Panhias, having herself to call somewhere in the village, give orders, or change her dress. His only compensation was that he could talk about his little pupil. He confided to Mme. Panhias his own observations concerning the changing moods of ZozÉ. Some mornings she seemed a prey to utter weariness, without any notable event justifying these fits of sadness. To what could he attribute them? Mme. Panhias, who had secretly noted the coincidence of such crises with the non-arrival of letters bearing the Deauville post-mark, replied evasively:

“It is her natourre to be like this! How can it be helped?”

“It may be so!” M. Raindal approved. “Quite so!... A dreamy nature!... A nature essentially melancholy!”

And he promised himself to neglect nothing that could bring distraction to his little pupil.

He even consented to play tennis with her, one afternoon, for fear of disappointing her. ZozÉ was on one side, M. Raindal and Aunt Panhias together on the other. Rather because he was all out of breath than for fear of compromising his own dignity, the master gave it up after a few minutes. His success in that game had been mediocre. Moved by a feeling of self-denial, ZozÉ did not repeat the attempt.

She also meant to show solicitude. She was sorry for poor M. Rainda family worries, of which he had given her a few significant illustrations. Whenever the master opened a letter from Langrune in front of her, she never failed to inquire whether his ladies showed less malice.

“Phew!... Icy.... Always ice-like!... Inquiries as to my health.... News of their own.... Compliments for you.... Kisses.... Hardly ten lines.... Read for yourself!”

She scanned the page, remembering Geral letters—notes whose laconism hardly exceeded that of the maste relatives.

“Yes, dear master!” she sighed.... “As you say, humanity is very stupid!”

On such days, out of pity for his sorrows which were so similar to her own, she was less rigorous towards the furtive kisses with which M. Raindal sought out her hands, gloved or bare, on every possible occasion. She racked her brains to order delicate dishes which she knew would please him. Then, the dinner ended, if he did not fall asleep, she read to him in the drawing-room—a newspaper or a volume of history. She read timidly, doing her best, with incorrect intonations, little gir errors which almost melted the maste heart. Or else—height of delights—she accepted his arm for a walk in the garden, along the lawn, in front of the terrace. When the sky was cloudy, M. Raindal, under the veil of obscurity, daringly kissed the young woma hand. Once he almost risked a nearer kiss, on her neck, taking advantage of the half-dÉcolletÉ evening dress which Mme. Chambannes wore. But, on the verge of executing the movement, he was seized with such a fear that he stopped dead on the spot.

“Are you ill, dear master?” ZozÉ asked.

“No!” he replied, starting again. “I was listening to the wind in the branches!”

When he reached his room after these nocturnal frolics, he had difficulty in going to sleep. Reflections bubbled in him in foaming cascades. He counted up the number of kisses Mme. Chambannes had tolerated since the morning: one in the Verneuil wood, another in the park before lunch, another in the afternoon, in Zoz own room, where he had gone on the pretext of asking for a book, a fifth and even a sixth one in the evening, below the terrace.... He modestly admitted to himself that these were childish calculations and not devoid of vanity!

But what weight have metaphysical considerations against the overwhelming reality of our joys? The latter know no other limit than the variations of our feelings. If they reach exaltation, we should not dismiss their enthusiasm with contempt; if they fall or diminish, what philosophy can lift them up again? Thus M. Raindal meditated, with a growing scorn for speculative pleasures.

He often reached a state of extreme frankness, in the course of those solemn examinations, when his naked soul spoke to his mind, as a wife to her husband. It was quite true! M. Raindal did not attempt to deny it; he was slightly in love with his pretty little pupil. At her approach, he felt himself blush; he felt those emotions and internal flutterings which, according to general opinion, are signs of infatuation. To be sure, it was a harmless love, a flame that could not scorch, the last radiation of his heart! What danger did he run in rejoicing at those crepuscular lights which life, in a last act of kindness, sometimes kindles again on the road that leads to the grave? What wrong did he do when he drew from those illicit kisses a sensation of renewed youth, a continuous denial given to the fatal decline of his years?

These grave thoughts saddened him. He deplored being so old; he regretted that he had not known his dear friend Mme. Chambannes sooner. Again, not to mention the forthcoming departure which would separate him from the young woman, how many hours near her had Fate in store for him?... Under a rush of bitterness, he would sit down to write to ThÉrÈse, to attempt a new project. August was drawing to an end. M. Raindal, from words Mme. Chambannes let fall, was inclined to conclude that a prolongation of his visit would please his hostess. In the course of many chats, she had seemed to indicate that the arrival of the two ladies in September would not be unwelcome to her. What did these latter say to that? Would they join the master, instead of returning to Paris, during those “days of intense heat” which threatened to persist? M. Raindal did not intend to force their hands. Nevertheless, he was of the opinion that their ill-humor had lasted too long, and it did not seem right that they should a second time refuse such cordial advances.

He went to bed revived by the hope one acquires through the mere voicing of on desires. And, the next day, when he saw ZozÉ again, all smiling and fresh in a light morning gown, like a nymph of dawn, the last vapors of his melancholy fled away.

“Where are you going, dear master?” she cried merrily from her window.

He looked up and made friendly signals to her with his hand.

“I am going to the stables to take some sugar to Notpou.... After that I shall go to the post-office to mail a letter to my family!”

“Hurry up, dear master! I shall be ready in half an hour.”

He looked back, five steps away, placing his hands above his eyes. She was still smiling, leaning on the balcony. The wide sleeves of her gown had slipped apart and showed the white flesh of her arm, folded on the balustrade.

“If only those women agree to come!” thought M. Raindal, as he walked towards the stables.

One morning, as he returned from mailing the fourth letter to them in one week—three having been left unanswered—he caught up with the village postman on whose route the chÂteau was.

“A letter for you, monsieur!” the man said as he saluted.

The master slowed down. It was a letter from Langrune. The Raindal ladies admitted that he was right in his remarks concerning the heat. Consequently, they would delay their departure and not return to Paris until about September 15th. Of Les Frettes, of Mme. Chambannes, not a word was said.

“Fools!” the master murmured with disappointment.

But his satisfaction was stronger. After all, this gave him the desired postponement, the right to remain at Les Frettes. Who knew but that the two women, had they been coming, would have made him uncomfortable with their humiliating surveillance! As to their coldness, their hidden enmity, he would see them on his return, and subdue them, cost what it might!

He walked so fast that he met the postman coming out of the door of the chÂteau.

In the middle of the terrace, the stone balustrade of which ran all round the house, ZozÉ sat dreaming in a wicker armchair. In front of her some opened letters lay on a little table beside the tea tray.

“Anything new, dear master?” she asked. “The postman told me he had given you a letter.... Was it from your family?”

M. Raindal stammered confused explanations.

“Well, then, when will you be leaving?” asked ZozÉ calmly.

He looked at her with a somewhat disappointed expression.

“Eh! I am not going, mon amie.... Since you are willing, I shall be happy to stay.”

He glanced to the left, then to the right, and seized Zoz hand, bending over her.

“I, too, have some great news now!” the young woman declared, suppressing a gesture of enervation while M. Raindal completed a heavy kiss. “First of all, I have a telegram from George. He is coming back on September 1st, Monday ... in three days!”

“Ah!” M. Raindal said carelessly. “Good! How is he!”

“Very well! You may read his telegram.... And then....”

“And then?” the master repeated, oppressed with anxiety.

“Then? Well, I have received a letter from the Messrs. de Meuze who inform me that they are coming to spend a week at Les Frettes.”

M. Rainda lips twisted. He attempted an emphatic objection:

“But you assured me....”

“Yes, that they would open the shooting season.... They are going to do that, in the Poitou, where it does open until the 12th.”

“That is different!” murmured the master in a tone of defeat. “When do they arrive?”

“Monday, also!”

The master drew in his breath and asked, in a firmer voice:

“The same day as your husband?”

“Yes!” ZozÉ replied, watching him from the corner of one eye. “That is to say, George will arrive at nine. Uncle Panhias will meet him at the Gare du Nord, and he cannot be here before eleven. The Messrs. de Meuze arrive in the afternoon.... After all, George will be here a few hours later!”

“Tha right; a few hours later!” M. Raindal repeated, at all hazard.

He laid a hand upon his forehead, complaining of a sudden headache. The sun, no doubt ... or his haste in returning.

“With your permission, I shall not go out this morning!” he said. “I prefer to rest.”

Smiling, Mme. Chambannes watched him depart. Then a sudden sulkiness brought down the corners of her lips. After all, there was nothing for her to laugh at. Everything was taking an ugly turn. The master had taken seriously her banal words of courtesy to him and the regrets which, in a moment of anger, she had formulated concerning Gerald. Old Raindal was going to “stick to” Les Frettes for another fortnight! Thereupon, George was coming back from Bosnia! The marquis and his son arriving at the same time—as agreed. She had no hope that Raldo would agree to hurry their arrival! Barely one evening to see each other again, find each other again! And this, besides, would have to be before old Raindal, who was already sulky and would keep his eye on them! What ill-luck, what complications and difficulties!

During the three days that followed, Mme. Chambannes apologized for being in a sad mood. She did not feel very well and her nerves ached.

M. Raindal affected to be sorry and full of goodwill. He, at most, risked a kiss or two, to keep himself in countenance. But he was not feeling very gay himself. Courteously, Uncle Panhias accused him of that fact. The master feigned surprise. No, really, he had no reason whatsoever for being sad; and to prove his care-free state, he chuckled, beating his chest:

“Ha ha! I not gay! Ha ha! Why should I not feel gay? Ha!”

Geral image passed, more clearly, before his mind; the maste little laugh stopped dead, as if broken in two by a sudden shock.