h the village. The whip was being vigorously
brandished from beneath the lowered hood.

'Where can he be off to at that rate?' murmured the old servant. 'He
will break his neck.'

The gig had just reached the rising ground on which the church was
built. Suddenly, the horse reared and stopped, and the doctor's head,
with its long white hair all dishevelled appeared from under the hood.

'Is Serge there?' he cried, in a voice full of indignant excitement.

La Teuse had stepped to the edge of the hill. 'Monsieur le Cure is in
his room,' she said. 'He must be reading his breviary. Do you want to
speak to him? Shall I call him?'

Uncle Pascal, who seemed almost distracted, made an angry gesture with
his whip hand. Bending still further forward, at the risk of falling
out, he replied:

'Ah! he's reading his breviary, is he? No! no! don't call him. I should
strangle him, and that would do no good. I wanted to tell him that
Albine was dead. Dead! do you hear me? Tell him, from me, that she is
dead!'

And he drove off, lashing his horse so fiercely that it almost bolted.
But, twenty paces away, he pulled up again, and once more stretching out
his head, cried loudly:

'Tell him, too, from me, that she was _enceinte_! It will please him to
know that.'

Then the gig rolled on wildly again, jolting dangerously as it ascended
the stony hill that led to the Paradou. La Teuse was quite dumbfounded.
But Brother Archangias sniggered and looked at her with savage delight
glittering in his eyes. She noticed this at last, and thrust him away
from her, almost making him fall down the steps.

'Be off with you!' she stammered, full of anger, seeking to relieve her
feelings by abusing him. 'I shall grow to hate you. Is it possible to
rejoice at any one's death? I wasn't fond of the girl, myself; but it is
very sad to die at her age. Be off with you, and don't go on sniggering
like that, or I will throw my scissors in your face!'

It was only about one o'clock that a peasant, who had gone to Plassans
to sell vegetables, had told Doctor Pascal of Albine's death, and had
added that Jeanbernat wished to see him. The doctor now was feeling a
little relieved by what he had just shouted as he passed the parsonage.
He had gone out of his way expressly to give himself that satisfaction.
He reproached himself for the death of the girl as for a crime in which
he had participated. All along the road he had never ceased overwhelming
himself wi