pled napkin, his head between his hands, and what he thinks of he
keeps to himself. If I try to talk of you--and I have tried, Monsieur
Fabien--he gets up in a rage, and forbids me to open my mouth on the
subject. The house is not cheerful, Monsieur Fabien. Every one notices
how he has changed; Monsieur Lorinet and his lady never enter the doors;
Monsieur Hublette and Monsieur Horlet come and play dummy, looking all
the time as if they had come for a funeral, thinking it will please the
master. Even the clients say that the master treats them like dogs, and
that he ought to sell his practice."

"Then it isn't sold?"

"Not yet, but I think it will be before long."

"Listen to me, Madeleine; you have always been good and devoted to me;
I am sure you still are fond of me; do me one last service. You must
manage to put me up here without my uncle knowing it."

"Without his knowing it, Monsieur Fabien!"

"Yes, say in the library; he never goes in there. From there I can study
him, and watch him, without his seeing me, since he is so irritable and
so easily upset, and as soon as you see an opportunity I shall make use
of it. A sign from you, and down I come."

"Really, Monsieur Fabien--"

"It must be done, Madeleine; I must manage to speak to him before ten
o'clock to-morrow morning, for my bride is coming."

"The Parisienne? She coming here!"

"Yes, with her father, by the train which gets in at six minutes past
nine to-morrow."

"Good God! is it possible?"

"To see you, Madeleine; to see my uncle, to make my peace with him.
Isn't it kind of her?"

"Kind? Monsieur Fabien! I tremble to think of what will happen. All the
same, I shall be glad to have a sight of your young lady, of course."

And so we settled that Madeleine was not to say a word to my uncle about
my being in Bourges, within a few feet of him. If she perceived any
break in the gloom which enveloped M. Mouillard, she was to let me know;
if I were obliged to put off my interview to the morrow, and to pass the
night on the sofa-bed in the library, she was to bring me something to
eat, a rug, and "the pillow you used in your holidays when you were a
boy."

I was installed then in the big library on the first-floor, adjoining
the drawing-room, its other door opening on the passage opposite M.
Mouillard's door, and its two large windows on the garden. What a look
of good antique middle-class comfort there was about it, from the
floor of bees'-waxed o