w, and
let us finish the game. See, here's another king.'

But the Brother, holding up a card, went on growling:

'She must have come by some road that the devil alone knows for me to
have missed her to-day. Every afternoon I go and keep guard up yonder
by the Paradou. If ever I find them together again, I will acquaint
the hussy with a stout dogwood stick which I have cut expressly for her
benefit. And I shall keep a watch in the church as well now.'

He played his card, which La Teuse took with a knave. Then he threw
himself back in his chair and again burst into one of his loud laughs.
He did not seem to be able to work himself up into a genuine rage that
evening.

'Well, well,' he grumbled, 'never mind, even if she did see him, she had
a smacking fall on her nose. I'll tell you all about it, La Teuse. It
was raining, you know. I was standing by the school-door when I caught
sight of her coming down from the church. She was walking along quite
straight and upright, in her stuck-up fashion, in spite of the pouring
rain. But when she got into the road, she tumbled down full length, no
doubt because the ground was so slippery. Oh! how I did laugh! How I did
laugh! I clapped my hands, too. When she picked herself up again, I saw
she was bleeding at the wrist. I shall feel happy over it for a week.
I cannot think of her lying there on the ground without feeling the
greatest delight.'

Then, turning his attention to the game, he puffed out his cheeks and
began to chant the _De profundis_. When he had got to the end of it, he
began it all over again. The game came to a conclusion in the midst of
this dirge. It was he who was beaten, but his defeat did not seem to vex
him in the least.

When La Teuse had locked the door behind him, after first awakening Abbe
Mouret, his voice could still be heard, as he went his way through
the black night, singing the last verse of the psalm, _Et ipse redimet
Israel ex omnibus iniquitatibus ejus_, with extraordinary jubilation.

XI

That night Abbe Mouret slept very heavily. When he opened his eyes in
the morning, later than usual, his face and hands were wet with tears.
He had been weeping all through the night while he slept. He did not say
his mass that day. In spite of his long rest, he had not recovered from
his excessive weariness of the previous evening, and he remained in
his bedroom till noon, sitting in a chair at the foot of his bed. The
condition of stupor into w