nt; he wouldn't listen to me;
he doesn't love me now; he ill-treats me if I manifest any desire that
does not please him, so what can I do?"

The cure did not make any direct answer to this appeal.

"Then you bow before this sin! You submit to it!" he exclaimed. "You
consent to and tolerate adultery under your own roof! The crime is being
perpetrated before your eyes, and you refuse to see it! Are you a
Christian woman? Are you a wife and a mother?"

"What would you have me do?" she sobbed.

"Anything rather than allow this sin to continue," he replied.
"Anything, I tell you. Leave him. Flee from this house which has been
defiled."

"But I have no money, Monsieur l'abbe," she replied. "And I am not brave
now like I used to be. Besides, how can I leave without any proofs of
what you are saying? I have not the right to do so."

The priest rose to his feet, quivering with indignation.

"You are listening to the dictates of your cowardice, madame. I thought
you were a different woman, but you are unworthy of God's mercy."

She fell on her knees:

"Oh! Do not abandon me, I implore you. Advise me what to do."

"Open M. de Fourville's eyes," he said, shortly. "It is his duty to end
this _liaison_."

She was seized with terror at this advice.

"But he would kill them, Monsieur l'abbe! And should I be the one to
tell him? Oh, not that! Never, never!"

He raised his hand as if to curse her, his whole soul stirred with
anger.

"Live on in your shame and in your wickedness, for you are more guilty
than they are. You are the wife who condones her husband's sin! My place
is no longer here."

He turned to go, trembling all over with wrath. She followed him
distractedly, ready to give in, and beginning to promise; but he would
not listen to her and strode rapidly along, furiously shaking his big
blue umbrella which was nearly as high as himself. He saw Julien
standing near the gate superintending the pruning of some trees, so he
turned off to the left to reach the road by way of the Couillards' farm,
and as he walked he kept saying to Jeanne:

"Leave me, madame. I have nothing further to say to you."

In the middle of the yard, and right in his path, some children were
standing around the kennel of the dog Mirza, their attention
concentrated on something which the baron was also carefully considering
as he stood in their midst with his hands behind his back, looking like
a schoolmaster.

"Do come and see me agai