ne day," replied the canon, after a pause,
apparently issuing from a revery and wishing to conform to the rules
of politeness.

Birotteau, frightened at the length of time which had elapsed between
the question and the answer,--for he had, for the first time in his
life, taken his coffee without uttering a word,--now left the
dining-room where his heart was squeezed as if in a vise. Feeling that
the coffee lay heavy on his stomach, he went to walk in a sad mood
among the narrow, box-edged garden paths which outlined a star in the
little garden. As he turned after making the first round, he saw
Mademoiselle Gamard and the Abbe Troubert standing stock-still and
silent on the threshold of the door,--he with his arms folded and
motionless like a statue on a tomb; she leaning against the blind door.
Both seemed to be gazing at him and counting his steps. Nothing is so
embarrassing to a creature naturally timid as to feel itself the object
of a close examination, and if that is made by the eyes of hatred, the
sort of suffering it causes is changed into intolerable martyrdom.

Presently Birotteau fancied he was preventing Mademoiselle Gamard and
the abbe from walking in the narrow path. That idea, inspired equally
by fear and kindness, became so strong that he left the garden and
went to the church, thinking no longer of his canonry, so absorbed was
he by the disheartening tyranny of the old maid. Luckily for him he
happened to find much to do at Saint-Gatien,--several funerals, a
marriage, and two baptisms. Thus employed he forgot his griefs. When
his stomach told him that dinner was ready he drew out his watch and
saw, not without alarm, that it was some minutes after four. Being
well aware of Mademoiselle Gamard's punctuality, he hurried back to
the house.

He saw at once on passing the kitchen door that the first course had
been removed. When he reached the dining-room the old maid said, with
a tone of voice in which were mingled sour rebuke and joy at being
able to blame him:--

"It is half-past four, Monsieur Birotteau. You know we are not to wait
for you."

The vicar looked at the clock in the dining-room, and saw at once, by
the way the gauze which protected it from dust had been moved, that
his landlady had opened the face of the dial and set the hands in
advance of the clock of the cathedral. He could make no remark. Had he
uttered his suspicion it would only have caused and apparently
justified one of those f