f anxious to know his fate quickly, she saw
that Dr. Pascal approved--he looked grave, he nodded his head as if
to say that this wish seemed to him very natural. Clotilde, herself,
ceasing to smile, seemed to listen to him with deference. But she
manifested some surprise. Why did they press her? Master had fixed the
marriage for the second week in June; she had, then, two full months
before her. Very soon she would speak about it with Ramond. Marriage was
so serious a matter that they might very well give her time to reflect,
and let her wait until the last moment to engage herself. And she said
all this with her air of good sense, like a person resolved on coming to
a decision. And Felicite was obliged to content herself with the evident
desire that both had that matters should have the most reasonable
conclusion.

"Indeed I believe that it is settled," ended Felicite. "He seems to
place no obstacle in the way, and she seems only to wish not to act
hastily, like a girl who desires to examine her heart closely, before
engaging herself for life. I will give her a week more for reflection."

Martine, sitting on her heels, was looking fixedly on the ground with a
clouded face.

"Yes, yes," she murmured, in a low voice, "mademoiselle has been
reflecting a great deal of late. I am always meeting her in some corner.
You speak to her, and she does not answer you. That is the way people
are when they are breeding a disease, or when they have a secret on
their mind. There is something going on; she is no longer the same, no
longer the same."

And she took the dibble again and planted a leek, in her rage for work;
while old Mme. Rougon went away, somewhat tranquillized; certain, she
said, that the marriage would take place.

Pascal, in effect, seemed to accept Clotilde's marriage as a thing
settled, inevitable. He had not spoken with her about it again, the
rare allusions which they made to it between themselves, in their hourly
conversations, left them undisturbed; and it was simply as if the two
months which they still had to live together were to be without end, an
eternity stretching beyond their view.

She, especially, would look at him smiling, putting off to a future
day troubles and decisions with a pretty vague gesture, as if to leave
everything to beneficent life. He, now well and gaining strength daily,
grew melancholy only when he returned to the solitude of his chamber
at night, after she had retired. He shudd