poor girl reflected on the caprice of
chance in absolutely transforming a woman's existence, and began to dream
vaguely of a magnificent future which might perhaps be in store for
herself without her suspecting it.

In everybody's opinion Risler was a dishonored husband. Two assistants in
the printing-room--faithful patrons of the Folies Dramatiques--declared
that they had seen Madame Risler several times at their theatre,
accompanied by some escort who kept out of sight at the rear of the box.
Pere Achille, too, told of amazing things. That Sidonie had a lover, that
she had several lovers, in fact, no one entertained a doubt. But no one
had as yet thought of Fromont jeune.

And yet she showed no prudence whatever in her relations with him. On the
contrary, she seemed to make a parade of them; it may be that that was
what saved them. How many times she accosted him boldly on the steps to
agree upon a rendezvous for the evening! How many times she had amused
herself in making him shudder by looking into his eyes before every one!
When the first confusion had passed, Georges was grateful to her for
these exhibitions of audacity, which he attributed to the intensity of
her passion. He was mistaken.

What she would have liked, although she did not admit it to herself,
would have been to have Claire see them, to have her draw aside the
curtain at her window, to have her conceive a suspicion of what was
passing. She needed that in order to be perfectly happy: that her rival
should be unhappy. But her wish was ungratified; Claire Fromont noticed
nothing and lived, as did Risler, in imperturbable serenity.

Only Sigismond, the old cashier, was really ill at ease. And yet he was
not thinking of Sidonie when, with his pen behind his ear, he paused a
moment in his work and gazed fixedly through his grating at the drenched
soil of the little garden. He was thinking solely of his master, of
Monsieur "Chorche," who was drawing a great deal of money now for his
current expenses and sowing confusion in all his books. Every time it was
some new excuse. He would come to the little wicket with an unconcerned
air:

"Have you a little money, my good Planus? I was worsted again at
bouillotte last night, and I don't want to send to the bank for such a
trifle."

Sigismond Planus would open his cash-box, with an air of regret, to get
the sum requested, and he would remember with terror a certain day when
Monsieur Georges, then only twen