t, when night came on, the old woman, touched but inexorable, said
to her son: "She is a good, all the same. 'Tis a pity she is so black;
but indeed she is too much so. I couldn't get used to it. She must go
back again. She is too, too black!"

And young Boitelle said to his sweetheart:

"She will not consent. She thinks you are too black. You must go back
again. I will go with you to the train. No matter--don't fret. I am
going to talk to them after you are started."

He then conducted her to the railway-station, still cheering her with
hope, and, when he had kissed her, he put her into the train, which he
watched as it passed out of sight, his eyes swollen with tears.

In vain did he appeal to the old people. They would never give their
consent.

And when he had told this story, which was known all over the country,
Antoine Boitelle would always add:

"From that time forward I have had no heart for anything--for anything
at all. No trade suited me any longer, and so I became what I am--a
nightcart-man."

People would say to him:

"Yet you got married."

"Yes, and I can't say that my wife didn't please me, seeing that I've
got fourteen children; but she is not the other one, oh no--certainly
not! The other one, mark you, my negress, she had only to give me one
glance, and I felt as if I were in Heaven!"

* * * * *

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VIII., by Guy de Maupassant

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