If the Abbé seldom referred to such matters as this, he frequently spoke on the subject of charity. Marthe was very tender-hearted, and tears rose to her eyes at the slightest tale of trouble. It seemed to please the priest to see her so moved to pity; and every evening he told her some fresh story of sorrow, and kept her constantly excited with compassion. She would let her work fall, and clasp her hands as, with a sad, pitying face, she gazed into his eyes and listened to him as he recounted heart-rending details of how some poor persons had died of starvation, or how others had been goaded by misery into committing base crimes. At these times she fell completely under his influence, and he might have done what he willed with her.

About the middle of February a deplorable occurrence threw Plassans into dismay. It was discovered that a number of young girls, scarcely more than children, had fallen into evil courses while loafing about the streets, and it was even rumoured that some persons of high position in the town would be compromised. For a week Marthe was very painfully affected by this discovery, which caused the greatest sensation. She was acquainted with one of the unfortunate girls, who was the niece of her cook, Rose; and she could not think of the poor little creature without shuddering.

'It is a great pity,' said Abbé Faujas to her one evening, 'that there isn't a Home at Plassans on the model of the one at Besançon.'

Then, in reply to Marthe's pressing questions, the Abbé explained to her the constitution of this Home. It was a sort of refuge for girls from eight to fifteen years of age, the daughters of working men, whose parents were obliged to leave them alone during the day while they themselves went to their employment. During the day-time these girls were set to do needlework, and in the evening they were sent back to their parents, the latter having then returned home from their work. By this system the children were brought up out of the reach of vice and in the midst of good examples. Marthe thought the idea an admirable one, and she gradually became so prepossessed in its favour that she could talk of nothing else than the necessity of founding a similar institution at Plassans.

'We might put it under the patronage of the Virgin,' Abbé Faujas suggested. 'But there are such difficulties in the way! You have no idea of the trouble there is in effecting the least good work! What is quite essential to the success of such a scheme as this is some woman with a motherly heart, full of zeal and absolutely devoted to the work.'

Marthe lowered her head and looked at Désirée, who was asleep by her side, and she felt tears welling from beneath her eyelids. She made inquiries as to the steps that it would be necessary to take for founding such a Home, the cost of erecting it, and the annual expenses.

'Will you help me?' she suddenly asked the priest one evening.

Abbé Faujas gravely took her hand and held it within his own for a moment, telling her that she had one of the fairest souls he had ever known. He would willingly do what he could, he assured her, but he should rely altogether upon her, for the assistance that he himself would be able to give would be small. It would be for her to form a committee of the ladies of the town, to collect subscriptions, and to take upon herself, in a word, all the delicate and onerous duties which are connected with an appeal to the charity of the public. He appointed a meeting with her for the following day at Saint-Saturnin's to introduce her to the diocesan architect, who would be able to tell her much better than he himself could do about the expenses that would have to be incurred.

Mouret was very gay that evening when they went to bed. He had not allowed Madame Faujas to win a single game.

'You seem quite pleased about something to-night, my dear,' he said to his wife. 'Did you see what a beating I gave the old lady downstairs?'

Then as he observed Marthe taking a silk dress out of her wardrobe, he asked her with some surprise if she intended to go out in the morning. He had not heard anything of the conversation in the dining-room between his wife and the priest.

'Yes,' she replied, 'I have to go out. I have to meet Abbé Faujas at the church about a matter which I will tell you of.'

He stood motionless in front of her, and gazed at her with an expression of stupefaction, wondering if she were not really jesting with him. Then, without any appearance of displeasure, he said in his bantering fashion:

'Hallo! hallo! well I never expected that! So you've gone over to the priests now!'

VIII

The next morning Marthe began by calling on her mother, to whom she explained the pious undertaking which she was contemplating. She became almost angry when the old lady smilingly shook her head, and she gave her to understand that she considered her lacking in charity.

'It is one of Abbé Faujas's ideas, isn't it?' Félicité suddenly inquired.

'Yes,' Marthe replied in surprise: 'we have talked a good deal about it together. But how did you know?'

Madame Rougon shrugged her shoulders without vouchsafing any definite reply. Then she continued with a show of animation:

'Well, my dear, I think you are quite right. You ought to have some kind of occupation, and you have found a very good one. It has always distressed me very much to see you perpetually shut up in that lonely, death-like house of yours. But you mustn't count upon my assistance. I would rather not appear in the matter, for people would say that it was I who was really doing everything, and that we had come to an understanding together to try to force our ideas upon the town. I should prefer that you yourself should have all the credit of your charitable inspiration. I will help you with my advice, if you will let me, but with nothing more.'

'I was hoping that you would join the committee,' said Marthe, who felt a little alarmed at the thought of finding herself alone in such an onerous undertaking.

'No! no! my presence on it would only do harm, I can assure you. Make it well known, on the contrary, that I am not going to be on the committee, that I have been asked, and have refused, excusing myself on the ground that I am too much occupied. Let it be understood, even, that I have no faith in your scheme; and that, you will see, will influence the ladies at once. They will be delighted to take part in charitable work in which I have no share. Go and see Madame Rastoil, Madame de Condamin, Madame Delangre, and Madame Paloque. Be sure to see Madame Paloque; she will feel flattered, and will help you more than all the others. If you find any difficulty about anything, come here again and tell me.'

She accompanied her daughter to the head of the stairs; then she stopped and looked her in the face, saying with her sharp smile:

'I hope the dear Abbé keeps well.'

'Yes, he is quite well,' replied Marthe. 'I am going to Saint-Saturnin's, where I am to meet the diocesan architect.'

Marthe and the priest had considered that matters were still in too indefinite a stage for them to disturb the architect, and so they had planned just to meet him at Saint-Saturnin's, where he came every day to inspect a chapel that happened to be under repair at the time. It would seem like a chance meeting. When Marthe walked up the church, she caught sight of Abbé Faujas and Monsieur Lieutaud—the architect—talking together on some scaffolding, from which they descended as soon as they saw her. One of the Abbé's shoulders was quite white with plaster, and he seemed to be taking a great interest in the operations.

At this hour of the afternoon, there were no worshippers or penitents in the church, and the nave and aisles were quite deserted, encumbered only by a litter of chairs, which two vergers were noisily setting in order. Workmen were calling to each other from the tops of ladders, and trowels were scraping against the walls. There was so little appearance of devotion about Saint-Saturnin's that Marthe had not even crossed herself on entering. She took a seat opposite to the chapel that was being repaired, between Abbé Faujas and Monsieur Lieutaud, just as she would have done if she had gone to consult the latter in his office.

The conversation lasted for a good half-hour. The architect showed much kindly interest in the scheme. But he advised them not to erect a special building for the Home of the Virgin, as the Abbé called the projected refuge. It would cost too much money, he thought; and it would be better to buy some building already in existence, and adapt it to suit the requirements of their scheme. He suggested a house in the Faubourg which, after being used as a boarding-school, had passed into the hands of a forage dealer, and was now for sale. A few thousand francs would enable one to entirely transform the place and restore it from its present ruinous condition; and he promised them all kinds of wonderful things: a handsome entrance, spacious rooms, and a court planted with trees. By degrees, Marthe and the priest raised their voices, and they discussed details beneath the echoing vaults of the nave, while Monsieur Lieutaud scratched the flag-stones with the tip of his stick to give them an idea of the façade he suggested.

'It is settled, then,' said Marthe, as she took leave of the architect. 'You will make a little estimate, won't you, so that we may know what we are about? And please keep our secret, will you?'

Abbé Faujas wished to escort her as far as the door of the church. As they passed together before the high-altar, however, while she was still briskly talking to him, she was suddenly surprised to miss him from her side. She turned round and saw him bent almost double before the great cross, veiled with muslin. The sight of him, covered as he was with plaster, bent in this way before the cross, gave her a singular feeling. She recollected where she was, glanced round her with an uneasy expression and trod as silently as she could. When they reached the door, the Abbé, who had become very grave and serious, silently reached out his finger, which he had dipped in the holy water, and she crossed herself in great disquietude of mind. Then the muffled doors softly fell back behind her with a sound like a sigh.

From the church Marthe repaired to Madame de Condamin's. She felt quite happy as she walked through the streets in the fresh air; the few visits that she had now to make seemed to her almost like pleasure-parties. Madame de Condamin welcomed her with an air of friendly surprise. That dear Madame Mouret came so seldom! When she learned the business on hand, she declared herself charmed with it, and was quite ready to further it in every possible way. She was wearing a lovely mauve dress, with knots of pearl-grey ribbon, in that pretty boudoir of hers where she played the part of an exiled Parisienne.

'You did quite right to count upon me,' she exclaimed as she pressed Marthe's hands. 'Who ought to help those poor girls if it isn't we whom people accuse of setting them a bad example by our luxury? It is frightful to think of those children being exposed to all those horrible dangers. It has made me feel quite ill. I am entirely at your service.'

When Marthe told her that her mother could not join the committee she displayed still greater enthusiasm for the scheme.

'It is a pity Madame Rougon has so many things to do,' she said with a touch of irony; 'she would have been of great assistance to us. But it can't be helped. No one can do more than they are able. I have plenty of friends. I will go and see the Bishop; and move heaven and earth if it's necessary. I'll promise you that we shall succeed.'

She would not listen to any of the particulars about the expenses. She was quite sure, she said, that whatever money was wanted would be found, and she meant the Home to be a credit to the committee, as handsome and as comfortable as possible. She added with a laugh that she quite lost her head when she began to dabble in figures; but she undertook to charge herself with the preliminary steps and the general furtherance of the scheme. Dear Madame Mouret, said she, was not accustomed to begging, and she would accompany her on her visits and would even take several of them off her hands altogether. By the end of a quarter of an hour she had made the business entirely her own, and it was now she who gave instructions to Marthe. The latter was just about to take her leave when Monsieur de Condamin came into the room; so she lingered on, feeling very ill at ease, however, and not daring to say any more on the subject of her visit in the presence of a man who was rumoured to be compromised in that matter of the poor girls with whose shameful story the town was ringing.

But Madame de Condamin explained the great scheme to her husband, who listened with an appearance of perfect ease, and gave utterance to the most moral sentiments. He considered the scheme an extremely proper one.

'It is an idea which could only have occurred to a mother,' he said gravely, in a tone which made it impossible to tell whether he was serious or not. 'Plassans will be indebted to you, madame, for a purer morality.'

'But I must tell you that the idea is not my own! I have merely adopted it,' replied Marthe, made uneasy by these praises. 'It was suggested to me by a person whom I esteem very highly.'

'Who was that?' asked Madame de Condamin, with a show of curiosity.

'Abbé Faujas.'

Then Marthe, with great frankness, told them what a high opinion she had of the priest. She made no allusion to the unpleasant stories that had been circulated about him, but she represented him as a man worthy of the highest respect, whom she was very happy to receive in her home. Madame de Condamin nodded approvingly as she listened.

'I always said so!' she exclaimed. 'Abbé Faujas is a very distinguished priest. But there are such a lot of malicious people about! Now, however, that you receive him in your home, they don't venture to say anything more against him; all that calumnious talk has been cut short. The idea, you say, is his. We shall have to persuade him, then, to take a prominent part in putting it into execution. For the present we will keep the matter very quiet. I can assure you that I always liked and defended the Abbé.'

'I recollect talking with him, and I thought him a very good fellow,' remarked the conservator of rivers and forests.

His wife silenced him with a gesture. She occasionally treated him in a very cavalier style. Truth to tell, Monsieur de Condamin alone bore the shame attaching to the equivocal marriage which he was charged with having made; the young woman, whom he had brought from no one knew where, had got herself forgiven and liked by the whole town, thanks to her pleasant ways and taking looks, to which provincial folks are more susceptible than might be imagined.

Monsieur de Condamin understood that he was in the way in this virtuous consultation.

'I will leave you to your good designs,' he said with a slight touch of irony. 'I am going to smoke a cigar. Octavie, don't forget to be dressed in good time. We are going to the Sub-Prefecture this evening, you know.'

When he had left the room, the two women resumed their conversation for a few moments longer, returning to what they had previously been saying, expressing pity for the poor girls who yielded to temptation, and manifesting much anxiety to shelter them from danger. Madame de Condamin inveighed eloquently against vice.

'Well, then!' she said, as she pressed Marthe's hand for the last time, 'it is all settled, and I shall be entirely at your service as soon as you call for my help. If you go to see Madame Rastoil and Madame Delangre, tell them that I will undertake to do everything, and that all we want from them is their names. My idea is a good one, don't you think? We won't depart a hair's breadth from it. Give my compliments to Abbé Faujas.'

Marthe at once proceeded to call upon Madame Delangre, and then upon Madame Rastoil. She found them very polite, but less enthusiastic than Madame de Condamin. They discussed the pecuniary side of the scheme. A large sum of money would be required, they said; the charity of the public would certainly never provide it, and there was a great risk of the whole business coming to a ridiculous termination. Marthe tried to reassure them, and plied them with figures. Then they asked her what ladies had consented to join the committee. The mention of Madame de Condamin's name left them silent, but when they learned that Madame Rougon had excused herself from joining, they became more amiable.

Madame Delangre had received Marthe in her husband's private room. She was a pale little woman whose dissoluteness had remained a matter of legend in Plassans.

'Indeed,' she ended by saying, 'there is nothing I should like to see better. It would be a school of virtue for the youth of the working-classes, and it would be the means of saving many weak souls. I cannot refuse my assistance, for I feel that I could be of much use to you through my husband, who as mayor of the town is brought into continual contact with all the influential people. But I must ask you to allow me till to-morrow before I give a definite reply. Our position requires us to exercise circumspection, and I should like to consult Monsieur Delangre.'

In Madame Rastoil Marthe encountered a woman who was equally listless but more prudish, and who sought for irreproachable words when referring to the unfortunate girls who had fallen. She was a sleek, plump person, and Marthe found her embroidering a very gorgeous alb, between her two daughters, whom she sent away at her visitor's first words.

'I am much obliged to you for having thought of me,' she said; 'but really I am very much occupied. I am already on several committees and I don't know whether I should have the time. I have had some such idea as your own myself, but my scheme was a larger one and, perhaps, more complete and comprehensive. For a whole month I have been intending to talk to the Bishop about it, but I have never been able to find the time. Well! we will unite our efforts, and I will tell you my own views, for I think you are making a mistake in some points. Since it seems necessary, I will surrender still more of my time. But it was only yesterday that my husband said to me: "Really, you never attend to your own affairs; you are always looking after other people's."'

Marthe glanced at her curiously, thinking of her old entanglement with Monsieur Delangre, which folks still chuckled over in the cafés of the Cours Sauvaire. The wives of the mayor and the presiding judge had received the mention of Abbé Faujas's name very suspiciously, the latter especially so. Marthe was a little vexed at this distrust of a person for whom she vouched; so she made a point of dwelling upon the Abbé's good qualities, and eventually forced the two women to acknowledge the merit of this priest, who lived a life of retirement and supported his mother.

On leaving Madame Rastoil's Marthe merely had to cross the road to reach Madame Paloque's, which was on the other side of the Rue Balande. It was seven o'clock, but she was anxious to make this last call, even if she were to keep Mouret waiting for dinner and get herself scolded in consequence. The Paloques were just about to sit down to table in a chilly dining-room, whose prim coldness spoke of provincial penury. Madame Paloque hastened to cover up the soup-tureen, vexed at being thus found at table. She was very polite, humble almost, anxious as she really felt about this visit which she had not expected. Her husband, the judge, sat before his empty plate with his hands upon his knees.

'The hussies!' he exclaimed, when Marthe spoke of the girls of the old quarter of the town. 'I heard some nice accounts of them to-day at court. It was they who led some of our most respectable townspeople astray. You do wrong, madame, to interest yourself about such vermin.'

'I am very much afraid,' said Madame Paloque in her turn, 'that I cannot be of much assistance to you. I know no one, and my husband would cut his hand off rather than beg for the smallest trifle. We have held ourselves quite aloof from everyone, disgusted as we are with all the injustices we have witnessed. We live here very quietly and modestly, happy in being forgotten and let alone. Even if promotion were offered to my husband now, he would refuse it. Wouldn't you, my dear?'

The judge nodded his head in assent and they exchanged a slight smile, while Marthe sat ill at ease in the presence of that hideous wrinkled couple, livid with gall and bitterness, who played so well the little comedy of feigned resignation. Fortunately she recalled her mother's counsels.

'I had quite counted upon you,' she said, making herself very pleasant. 'We shall have Madame Delangre, Madame Rastoil, and Madame de Condamin; but, between ourselves, those ladies will only give us their names. I should have liked to find some lady of good status and kindly, charitable disposition, who would have taken a stronger interest and shown more energy in the matter, and I thought that you would be the very person. Think what gratitude Plassans would owe us if we could only bring such an undertaking to a successful issue!'

'Of course, of course!' Madame Paloque murmured, quite delighted at Marthe's insinuating words.

'I am sure you are wrong in fancying that you are without power to assist us. It is very well known that Monsieur Paloque is a favourite at the Sub-Prefecture; and between ourselves I may say that he is intended to succeed Monsieur Rastoil. Ah, now! don't try to depreciate yourselves; your merits are known, and it is no use your trying to hide them. This would be a very good opportunity for Madame Paloque to emerge a little from the obscurity and privacy in which she keeps herself, and to let the world see what a head and what a heart she has!'

The judge seemed very restless. He looked at his wife with blinking eyes.

'Madame Paloque has not refused,' said he.

'No, certainly not,' interposed the latter. 'If you really stand in need of me, that settles the matter. I dare say I am only committing another piece of folly, and shall give myself a lot of trouble without ever getting a word of thanks for it. Monsieur Paloque can tell you of all the good works we've done without ever saying a word about them; and you can see for yourself what they've brought us to. Well, well, we can't change our natures, and I suppose we shall continue being dupes to the end! You may count upon me, dear madame.'

The Paloques rose and Marthe took leave of them, thanking them for their kindly interest. As she stopped for a moment on the landing to liberate a flounce of her dress which had caught between the banisters and the steps, she heard them talking with animation on the other side of the door.

'They want to enlist you because they want to make use of you!' the judge was saying in a bitter voice. 'You will be their beast of burden.'

'Of course!' replied his wife, 'but you may be sure that I'll make them pay for it with the rest!'

When Marthe at last got back home, it was nearly eight o'clock. Mouret had been waiting a whole half-hour for his dinner, and she was afraid that there would be a terrible scene. But, when she had undressed and come downstairs, she found her husband seated astride an overturned chair, tranquilly beating a tattoo on the tablecloth with his fingers. He was in a very teasing, bantering mood.

'Well,' said he, 'I had quite made up my mind that you were going to spend the night in a confessional-box. Now that you have taken to going to church, you had better give me notice when the priests invite you, so that I can dine out.'

All through the dinner he indulged in witticisms of this kind, and Marthe was more distressed by them than if he had openly stormed at her. Two or three times she cast a glance at him as if beseeching him to leave her in peace. But her looks only appeared to stimulate his wit. Octave and Désirée laughed at it all, but Serge remained silent and mentally took his mother's side. During dessert Rose came into the room, looking quite scared, with the news that Monsieur Delangre had called and wished to see madame.

'Hallo! have you begun to associate with the authorities as well?' exclaimed Mouret in his sneering fashion.

Marthe went into the drawing-room to receive the mayor. With much politeness the latter told her that he had felt unwilling to wait until the morrow to congratulate her upon her charitable idea. Madame Delangre was a little timid; she had done wrong in not immediately promising her co-operation, and he had now come to say in her name that she would be delighted to serve on the committee of lady patronesses of the Home of the Virgin. As for himself, he would do all he could to further the success of a scheme that would be so useful, so conducive to morality.

Marthe accompanied him to the street-door; and there, as Rose held up the lamp to light the footpath, the mayor added:

'Will you tell Abbé Faujas that I shall be glad to have a little conversation with him, if he will kindly call on me? As he has had experience of an establishment of this kind at Besançon, he will be able to give me valuable information. I mean the town to pay for the building, at any rate. Good-bye, dear madame. Give my best compliments to Monsieur Mouret, whom I won't disturb.'

When Abbé Faujas came down with his mother at eight o'clock Mouret merely said to him, with a laugh:

'So you walked my wife off to-day, eh? Well, don't spoil her for me too much, and don't make a saint of her.'

Then he turned to his card-play. He was anxious to revenge himself on Madame Faujas, who had defeated him three evenings in succession; and so Marthe was left free to tell the Abbé of all she had done during the day. She seemed full of child-like pleasure, and was still quite excited with her afternoon. The priest made her repeat certain details, and then promised to call on Monsieur Delangre, although he would have preferred remaining altogether in the background.

'You did wrong to mention my name at all,' he said, when he saw her so moved and yielding. 'But you are like all other women; the best causes would be spoilt in your hands.'

She looked at him in surprise at this harsh exclamation, recoiling and feeling that thrill of fear which she still occasionally experienced in the presence of his cassock. It was as though iron hands were being laid upon her shoulders and were forcing her into compliance with their will. Every priest looks upon woman as an enemy; but when the Abbé saw that she was hurt by his stern reproof he softened his voice and said:

'I think only of the success of your noble design. I am afraid that I should compromise it if I myself were to appear in it. You know very well that I am not a favourite in the town.'

Marthe, seeing him so humble, assured him that he was mistaken, and that all the ladies had spoken of him in the highest terms. They knew that he was supporting his mother, and that he led a quiet, retired life worthy of the greatest praise. Then they talked over the great scheme, dwelling on the smallest details of it, till eleven o'clock struck. It was a delightful evening.

Mouret had caught a word or two of the talk every now and then between the deals.

'And so,' he said, as they were going to bed, 'so you two are going to stamp out vice? It's a fine invention.'

Three days later the committee of patronesses was formally constituted. The ladies having elected Marthe as president, she, upon her mother's advice which she had privately sought, immediately named Madame Paloque treasurer. They both gave themselves a great deal of trouble in directing circulars and looking after a host of other petty details. In the meantime Madame de Condamin went from the Sub-Prefecture to the Bishop's, and from the Bishop's to the houses of various other influential persons, exhibiting some lovely toilettes, explaining in her pretty fashion 'the happy idea that had occurred to her,' and carrying off subscriptions and promises of assistance. Madame Rastoil, on the other hand, told the priests who came to her house on the Tuesday how she had formed a plan for rescuing unfortunate girls from vice, and then contented herself with charging Abbé Bourrette to inquire of the Sisters of Saint-Joseph if they would come and serve in the projected refuge; while Madame Delangre confided to a little company of functionaries that the town was indebted for the Home to her husband, who had also kindly given the committee the use of a room at the town-hall, where they could meet and deliberate at their ease. Plassans was speedily excited by this pious turmoil, and soon nothing but the Home of the Virgin was spoken of. A chorus of praise went up, and the friends of each lady patroness made up little parties and worked strenuously for the success of the undertaking. Within a week subscriptions were opened in all three quarters of the town, and as the 'Plassans Gazette' published lists of the subscriptions, a feeling of pride was awakened, and the most notable families vied as to which should be the most generous.

Amidst all the talk on the subject Abbé Faujas's name frequently cropped up. Although each of the lady patronesses claimed the idea of the refuge as her own, there was a prevailing belief that it was the Abbé who had brought it with him from Besançon. Monsieur Delangre, indeed, made an express statement to that effect at the meeting of the municipal council when it was decided to purchase the building which the diocesan architect had suggested as being best suited to the requirements of the Home. On the previous evening the mayor had had a lengthy conversation with the priest. They had shaken hands most cordially on parting, and the mayor's secretary had even heard them call each other 'my dear sir.' This brought about quite a revolution in the Abbé's favour. From that time he had a group of partisans who defended him against the attacks of his enemies.

Besides, the Mourets vouched for Abbé Faujas's respectability. Supported by Marthe's friendship, recognised as the originator of a good work, which he modestly refused to acknowledge as his own, he no longer manifested in the streets that appearance of humility which had led him to withdraw as much as possible from observation by keeping in the shadow of the houses. He bravely showed his new cassock in the sun and walked in the middle of the road. On his way from the Rue Balande to Saint-Saturnin's he now had to return a great number of bows. One Sunday Madame de Condamin stopped him after Vespers on the Place in front of the Bishop's house and kept him talking with her there for a good half-hour.

'Well, your reverence,' Mouret said to him with a laugh, 'you are quite in the odour of sanctity now. One would scarcely have anticipated that six months ago when I was the only one to say a good word for you! But if I were you I shouldn't trust too much to it all; you still have the Bishop's set against you.'

The priest lightly shrugged his shoulders. He knew quite well that what hostility he still met with came from the clergy. Abbé Fenil kept Monseigneur Rousselot trembling beneath his rough, hard will. However, when the grand-vicar, about the end of March, left Plassans on a short holiday, Abbé Faujas profited by his absence to make several calls upon the Bishop. Abbé Surin, the prelate's private secretary, reported that the 'wretched man' had been closeted for hours with his lordship, who had manifested an atrocious temper after each interview. When Abbé Fenil returned, Abbé Faujas discontinued his visits, and again drew into the background. But the Bishop still showed himself very much disturbed, and it was quite evident that something had occurred to upset his careless mind. At a dinner which he gave to his clergy he showed himself particularly friendly to Abbé Faujas, who was still only a humble curate at Saint-Saturnin's. Abbé Fenil then kept his thin lips more tightly closed than ever, but inwardly cursed his penitents when they politely asked him how he was in health.

And now at last Abbé Faujas manifested complete serenity. He still led a self-denying life, but he seemed permeated by a pleasant ease of mind. One Tuesday evening he triumphed definitively. He was looking out of the window of his room, enjoying the early warmth of springtide, when Monsieur Péqueur des Saulaies's guests came into the garden of the Sub-Prefecture and bowed to him from a distance. Madame de Condamin was there, and carried her familiarity so far as to wave her handkerchief to him. Just at the same time, on the other side, some guests came to sit on the rustic seats in front of the waterfall in Monsieur Rastoil's grounds. Monsieur Delangre, who was leaning over the terrace of the Sub-Prefecture, could see across Mouret's garden into the judge's place, owing to the sloping character of the ground.

'You will see,' he said, 'they won't deign even to notice him.'

But he was wrong. For Abbé Fenil, having turned his head as though by chance, took off his hat, whereupon all the other priests who happened to be present did the same, and Abbé Faujas returned their salute. Then, after slowly glancing over the two sets of guests on his right and his left, he quitted his window, carefully drawing his white and conventual-looking curtains.

IX

The month of April was very mild and warm, and in the evenings, after dinner, the young Mourets went to amuse themselves in the garden. Marthe and the priest, too, as they found the dining-room become very close, also went out on to the terrace. They sat a few steps from the open window, just outside the stream of light which the lamp cast upon the tall box hedges. Hid there in the deepening dusk, they discussed all the little details connected with the Home of the Virgin. This constant discussion of charitable matters seemed to give a tone of additional softness to their conversation. In front of them, between Monsieur Rastoil's huge pear-trees and the dusky chestnuts of the Sub-Prefecture, there was a large patch of open sky. The young people sported about under the arbours, while every now and then the voices of Mouret and Madame Faujas, who remained alone in the dining-room, deeply absorbed in their game, could be heard raised in passing altercations.

Sometimes Marthe, full of tender emotion, a gentle languor that made her words fall slowly from her lips, would check her speech as she caught sight of the golden train of some shooting star, and smile as she threw back her head a little and looked up at the heavens.

'There's another soul leaving purgatory and entering paradise!' she murmured, while, as the priest kept silent, she added: 'How pretty they are, those little beliefs! One ought to be able to remain a little girl, your reverence.'

She no longer now mended the family linen in the evening. She would have had to light a lamp on the terrace to see to do it, and she preferred the gloom of the warm night, which seemed to thrill her with peaceful happiness. Besides, she now went out every day, which fatigued her, and when dinner was over she had not energy enough to take up her needle. Rose had been obliged to undertake the mending, as Mouret was beginning to complain that his socks were all in holes.

To tell the truth Marthe was really very much occupied. Besides the committee meetings over which she presided, she had numerous other things to attend to, visits to make, and superintendence duties to exercise. She deputed much necessary writing and other little matters to Madame Paloque; but she was so eager to see the Home actually established, that she went off to the Faubourg, where the building stood, three times a week, to make sure that the workmen were not wasting their time. Whenever she thought that satisfactory progress was not being made, she hurried to Saint-Saturnin's to find the architect, and grumbled to him and begged him not to leave the men without his supervision, growing quite jealous, indeed, of the work which was being executed in the church, and saying that the chapel repairs were being much too quickly pushed forward. Monsieur Lieutaud smiled at all this, and assured her that everything would be completed within the stipulated time. But Abbé Faujas likewise protested that sufficient progress was not being made, and urged Marthe to give the architect no peace, so she ended by going to Saint-Saturnin's every day.

She went thither with her brain full of figures, or absorbed in thinking of walls that had to be pulled down and rebuilt. The chilliness of the church cooled her excitement a little. She dipped her fingers in the holy water and crossed herself, by way of doing as others did. The vergers grew to know her and bow to her, and she herself became quite familiar with the different chapels and the sacristy, whither she sometimes had to go in search of Abbé Faujas, and the wide corridor and low cloisters through which she had to pass. At the end of a month there was not a corner in Saint-Saturnin's which she did not know. Sometimes she had to wait for the architect, and then she would sit down in some retired chapel and rest after her hurried walk, recapitulating in her mind the host of things which she wanted to impress upon Monsieur Lieutaud. The deep, palpitating silence which surrounded her, and the dim religious light falling from the stained-glass windows, gradually plunged her into a vague, soft reverie. She began to love the lofty arches and the solemn bareness of the walls, the altars draped in protecting covers, and the chairs all arranged in order. As soon, indeed, as the padded doors swung to behind her, she began to experience a feeling of supreme restfulness, she forgot all the weary cares of the world, and perfect peace permeated her being.

'Saint-Saturnin's is such a pleasant place,' she said in an unguarded moment one evening before her husband, after a close, sultry day.

'Would you like us to go and sleep there?' Mouret asked, with a laugh.

Marthe felt hurt. The feeling of purely physical happiness which she experienced in the church began to distress her as being something wrong; and it was with a slight feeling of trouble that she thenceforward entered Saint-Saturnin's, trying to force herself to remain indifferent and uninfluenced by her surroundings, just as she would have been in the big rooms at the town hall. But in spite of herself she was deeply, distressfully affected. It was, however, a distress to which she willingly returned.

Abbé Faujas manifested no consciousness of the slow awakening which every day went on within her. He still retained with her the demeanour of a busy, obliging man, putting heaven on one side. He never showed anything of the priest. Sometimes, however, she would disturb him as he was going to read the burial office; and he would then speak to her for a moment between a couple of pillars in his surplice which exhaled a vague odour of incense and wax tapers. It was frequently a mere bricklayer's bill or some carpenter's claim that they spoke about, and the priest would just tell her the exact figures and then hurry away to attend to the funeral; she remaining there, lingering in the empty nave, while one of the vergers was extinguishing the candles. As Faujas, when he crossed the church with her, bowed before the high altar, she had acquired the habit of doing likewise, at first out of a feeling of mere propriety. But afterwards the action had become mechanical, and she now bowed when she was quite alone. Hitherto this act of reverence had been her only sign of devotion. Two or three times she had come to the church on days of high ceremonial of which she had not previously been aware: but when she saw the church was full of worshippers and heard the pealing of the organ, she hurried off, thrilled with sudden fear and not daring to cross the threshold.

'Well!' Mouret would frequently ask her with his sniggering laugh, 'when do you mean to take your first communion?'

He was perpetually teasing her, but she never replied, simply fixing upon him the gaze of her eyes, in which a passing brightness glistened when he went too far. By degrees he became more bitter, he was tired of mocking at her; and at the end of a month he quite lost his temper.

'What sense is there in going and mixing yourself up with a lot of priests?' he would growl at times when his dinner was not ready when he wanted it. 'You are always away from home now, there's no keeping you in the house for an hour at a time! I shouldn't mind it myself, if everything weren't going to pieces here. I never get any of my things mended, the table is not even laid by seven o'clock, there's no making anything out of Rose, and the whole place is left to rack and ruin.'

He picked up a house-cloth that was lying about, locked up a bottle of wine that had been left out, and began to wipe the dust off the furniture with his fingers, working himself up to a higher pitch of anger as he cried: 'There'll soon be nothing left for me to do but to take up a broom and put an apron on! You would see me do it without disturbing yourself, I know! I might do all the work of the house without your being any the wiser for it indeed! Do you know that I spent a couple of hours this morning in putting this cupboard in order? No, no, things can't go on any longer in this way!'

At other times there was a disturbance about the children. Once when Mouret came home he found Désirée 'wallowing like a young pig' in the garden, lying on her stomach before an ant-hole, and trying to find out what the ants might be doing in the ground.

'We may be very thankful, I'm sure, that you don't sleep away from the house as well!' he cried as soon as he caught sight of his wife. 'Come and look at your daughter! I wouldn't let her change her dress because I wished that you might see what a pretty sight she is.'

The girl cried bitterly while her father kept turning her round.

'Look at her now! Isn't she a nice spectacle? This is the way children go on when they are left to themselves! It isn't her fault, poor little innocent! At one time you couldn't leave her alone for five minutes: she would be getting into the fire, you said! Well, I expect she will be getting into the fire now, and everything will be burnt up, and then there'll be an end of it all!'

When Rose had taken Désirée away, he continued: 'You live now simply for other people's children. You don't give a moment to your own! What a goose you must be to go knocking yourself up for a parcel of hussies who only laugh at you! Go and walk about the ramparts any evening and you will see something of the conduct of those impudent creatures whom you talk of putting under the protection of the Virgin!'

He stopped to take breath and then went on again:

'At all events see that Désirée is properly taken care of before you go picking up girls from the gutter! There are holes as big as my fist in her dress. One of these days we shall be finding her in the garden with a leg or an arm broken. I don't say anything about Octave or Serge, though I should much prefer your being at home when they come back from college. They are up to all kinds of diabolical tricks. Only yesterday they split a couple of flag-stones on the terrace by letting off crackers. I tell you that if you don't keep yourself at home we shall find the whole house blown to bits one of these days!'

Marthe said a few words in self-defence. She had been obliged to go out, she urged. There was no doubt that Mouret, who possessed an ample fund of common sense, in spite of his proclivities for teasing and jeering, was right. The house was getting into a most unsatisfactory state. That once quiet spot indeed, where the sun had set so peacefully, was becoming uproarious, left to look after itself, suffering from the children's noisiness, the father's bursts of temper, and the mother's careless, indifferent lassitude. In the evening, at table, they dined badly and quarrelled amongst themselves. Rose did just what she liked, and she, by the way, was of opinion that her mistress was quite in the right.

Matters came to such a pass at last that Mouret, happening to meet his mother-in-law, complained to her bitterly of Marthe's conduct, although he was quite aware of the pleasure he afforded the old lady by revealing to her the troubles of his home.

'You astonish me extremely!' Félicité replied with a smile. 'Marthe always seemed to me to be afraid of you, and I considered her even too yielding and obedient. A woman ought not to tremble before her husband.'

'Ah, yes, indeed!' cried Mouret, with a hopeless look, 'once upon a time she would have sunk into the ground to avoid a quarrel; a mere glance was sufficient to make her do everything I desired. But that's all quite altered now. I may remonstrate and shout as much as I like, she still goes her own way. She doesn't reply, she hasn't as yet got to flying out at me, but that will come as well, I dare say, by-and-by.'

Félicité then answered with some hypocrisy:

'I will speak to Marthe if you like. But it might, perhaps, hurt her if I did. Matters of this kind are better kept between husband and wife. I don't feel very uneasy about them; I've no doubt that you'll soon get back again all the quiet peacefulness which you used to be so proud of.'

Mouret shook his head with downcast eyes.

'No! no!' he said; 'I know myself too well. I can make a noise, but it does no good. In reality I am as weak as a child. People are quite wrong in supposing that I gained my own way with my wife by force. She has generally done what I wanted her to do, because she was quite indifferent about everything, and would as soon do one thing as another. Mild as she looks, she is very obstinate, I can tell you. Well, I must try to make the best of it.'

Then, raising his eyes, he added:

'It would have been better if I had said nothing about all this to you; but you won't mention it to anyone, will you?'

When Marthe went to see her mother the next day, the latter received her with some show of coldness, and exclaimed:

'It is wrong of you, my dear, to show yourself so neglectful of your husband. I saw him yesterday and he is quite angry about it. I am well aware that he often behaves in a very ridiculous manner, but that does not justify you in neglecting your home.'

Marthe fixed her eyes upon her mother.

'Ah! he has been complaining about me!' she said curtly. 'The least he could do would be to keep silent, for I never complain about him.'

Then she began to talk of other matters, but Madame Rougon brought her back to the subject of her husband by inquiring after Abbé Faujas.

'Perhaps Mouret isn't very fond of the Abbé, and finds fault with you in consequence. Is that the case, do you think?'

Marthe showed great surprise.

'What an idea!' she exclaimed. 'What makes you think that my husband does not like Abbé Faujas? He has certainly never said anything to me which would lead me to imagine such a thing. He hasn't said anything to you, has he? Oh no! you are quite mistaken. He would go up to their rooms to fetch them if the mother didn't come down to have her game of cards with him.'

Mouret, indeed, never complained in any way about Abbé Faujas. He joked with him a little bluntly sometimes, and occasionally brought his name into the teasing banter with which he tormented his wife, but that was all.

One morning, as he was shaving, he said to Marthe:

'I'll tell you what, my dear; if ever you go to confession, take the Abbé for your director, and then your sins will, at any rate, be kept amongst ourselves.'

Abbé Faujas heard confessions on Tuesdays and Fridays, on which days Marthe used to avoid going to Saint-Saturnin's. She alleged that she did not want to disturb him; but she was really under the influence of that timid uneasiness which disquieted her whenever she saw him in his surplice redolent of the mysterious odours of the sacristy. One Friday, she went with Madame de Condamin to see how the works at the Home of the Virgin were getting on. The men were just finishing the frontage. Madame de Condamin found fault with the ornamentation, which, said she, was extremely mean and characterless. At the entrance there ought to have been two slender columns with a pointed arch, something at once light and suggestive of religion, something that would be a credit to the committee of lady patronesses. Marthe hesitated for a time, but she gradually admitted that the place looked very mean as it was. Then as the other pressed her, she promised to speak to Monsieur Lieutaud on the subject that very day. In order that she might keep her promise, she went to the cathedral before returning home. It was four o'clock when she got there, and the architect had just left. When she asked for Abbé Faujas, a verger told her that he was confessing in the chapel of Saint Aurelia. Then for the first time she recollected what day it was, and replied that she could not wait. But as she passed the chapel of Saint Aurelia on her way out, she thought that the Abbé might, perhaps, have already caught sight of her. The truth was that she felt singularly faint, and so she sat down outside the chapel, near the railing. And there she remained.

The sky was grey, and the church was steeped in twilight. Here and there in the aisles, already shrouded in darkness, gleamed a lamp, or some gilt candelabrum, or some Virgin's silver robe; and a pale ray filtered through the great nave and died away on the polished oak of the stalls and benches. Marthe had never before felt so completely overcome. Her legs seemed to have lost all their strength, and her hands were so heavy that she clasped them across her knees to save herself from having to support their weight. She allowed herself to drift into drowsiness, in which she still continued to hear and see, but in a very soft subdued fashion. The slight sounds wafted along beneath the vaulted roof, the falling of a chair, the slow step of some worshipper, all filled her with emotion, assumed a musical tone which thrilled her to the heart; while the last glimmers of daylight and the dusky shadows that crept up the pillars like covers of crape, assumed in her eyes all the delicate tints of shot silk. She gradually fell into a state of exquisite languor, in which she seemed to melt away and die. Everything around her then vanished, and she was thrilled with perfect happiness in her strange, trance-like condition.

The sound of a voice awoke her from this state of ecstasy.

'I am very sorry,' said Abbé Faujas; 'I saw you, but I could not get away.'

She then appeared to wake up with a start. She looked at him. He was standing before her in the dying light, in his surplice. His last penitent had just left, and the empty church seemed to be growing still more solemn.

'You want to speak to me?' he asked.

Marthe made an effort to recall her thoughts.

'Yes,' she murmured; 'but I can't remember now. Ah yes! it is about the frontage, which Madame de Condamin thinks too mean. There ought to be two columns instead of that characterless flat door. And up above one might put a pointed arch filled with stained glass. It would look very pretty. You understand what I mean, don't you?'

He gazed at her very gravely with his hands crossed over his surplice, and his head inclined towards her; and she, still seated, without strength to rise to her feet, went on stammering confusedly, as though she had been taken unawares in a sleep which she could not shake off.

'It would entail additional expense, of course; but we might have columns of soft stone with a very simple moulding. We might speak about it to the master mason, and he will tell us how much it would cost. But we had better pay him his last account first. It is two thousand one hundred and odd francs, I think. We have the money in hand; Madame Paloque told me so this morning. There will be no difficulty about that, Monsieur l'Abbé.'

She lowered her head, as though she felt oppressed by the gaze that was bent upon her. When she raised it again and met the priest's eyes, she clasped her hands together, after the manner of a child seeking forgiveness, and she burst into sobs. The priest allowed her to weep, still standing in silence in front of her. Then she fell on her knees before him, weeping behind her hands, with which she covered her face.

'Get up, I pray you,' said Abbé Faujas gently. 'It is before God that you should go and kneel.'

He helped her to rise and he sat down beside her. They talked together for a long time in low tones. The night had now fully fallen, and the lamps set golden specks gleaming through the black depths of the church. The murmur of their voices alone disturbed the silence in front of the chapel of Saint Aurelia. From the priest streamed a flood of words after each of Marthe's weak broken answers. When at last they rose, he seemed to be refusing her some favour which she was seeking with persistence. And leading her towards the door, he raised his voice as he said:

'No! I cannot, I assure you I cannot. It would be better for you to take Abbé Bourrette.'

'I am in great need of your advice,' Marthe murmured, beseechingly. 'I think that with your help everything would be easy to me.'

'You are mistaken,' he replied, in a sterner voice. 'On the contrary, I fear that my direction would be prejudicial to you to begin with. Abbé Bourrette is the priest you want, I assure you. Later on, I may perhaps give you a different reply.'

Marthe obeyed the priest's injunctions, and on the morrow the worshippers at Saint-Saturnin's were surprised to see Madame Mouret kneel before Abbé Bourrette's confessional. Two days later nothing but this conversion was spoken of in Plassans. Abbé Faujas's name was pronounced with subtle smiles by certain people, but on the whole the impression was a good one and in favour of the Abbé. Madame Rastoil complimented Madame Mouret in full committee, and Madame Delangre professed to see in the matter a first blessing vouchsafed by God who rewarded the lady patronesses for their good work by touching the heart of the only one amongst them who had not conformed with the requirements of religion. Madame de Condamin, taking Marthe aside, said to her:

'You have done right, my dear. What you have done is a necessity for a woman; and, besides, as soon as one begins to go about a little, it is necessary to go to church.'

The only matter of astonishment was her choice of Abbé Bourrette. That worthy man almost entirely confined himself to hearing the confessions of young girls. The ladies found him 'so very uninteresting.' On the Thursday at the Rougons' reception, before Marthe's arrival, the matter was talked over in a corner of the green drawing-room, and it was Madame Paloque with her waspish tongue who summed up the matter.

'Abbé Faujas has done quite right in not keeping her himself,' said she, with a twist of her mouth that made her still more hideous than usual; 'Abbé Bourrette is very successful in saving souls and appearances also.'

When Marthe came that evening her mother stepped forward to welcome her, and kissed her affectionately with some ostentation before the company. She herself had made her peace with God on the morrow of the Coup d'État. She was of opinion that Abbé Faujas might now venture to return to the green drawing-room; but he excused himself, making a pretext of his work and his love of privacy. Madame Rougon then fancied that he was planning a triumphal return for the following winter. The Abbé's success was certainly on the increase. For the first few months his only penitents had come from the vegetable-market held behind the cathedral, poor hawkers, to whose dialect he had quietly listened without always being able to understand it; but now, especially since all the talk there had been in connection with the Home of the Virgin, he had a crowd of well-to-do citizens' wives and daughters dressed in silk kneeling before his confessional-box. When Marthe quietly mentioned that he would not receive her amongst his penitents, Madame de Condamin was seized with a sudden whim, and deserted her director, the senior curate of Saint-Saturnin's, who was greatly distressed thereby, to transfer the guardianship of her soul to Abbé Faujas. Such a distinction as this gave the latter a firm position in Plassans society.

When Mouret learned that his wife now went to confession, he merely said to her:

'You have been doing something wrong lately, I suppose, since you find it necessary to go and tell all your affairs to a parson?'

In the midst of all this pious excitement he seemed to isolate himself and shut himself up in his own narrow and monotonous life still further. When his wife reproached him for complaining to her mother, he answered:

'Yes, you are right; it was wrong of me. It is foolish to give people any pleasure by telling them of one's troubles. However, I promise you that I won't give your mother this satisfaction a second time. I have been thinking matters over, and the house may topple down on our heads before I'll go whimpering to anyone again.'

From that time he never made any disparaging remarks about the management of the house or scolded his wife in the presence of strangers, but professed himself, as formerly, the happiest of men. This effort of sound sense cost him little, for he saw that it would tend to his comfort, which was the object of his constant thoughts. He even exaggerated his assumption of the part of a contented methodical citizen who took pleasure in living. Marthe only became aware of his impatience by his restless pacing up and down. For whole weeks he refrained from teasing or fault-finding as far as she was concerned, while upon Rose and his children he constantly poured forth his jeers, scolding them too from morning till night for the slightest shortcomings.

Previously he had only been economical, now he became miserly.

'There is no sense in spending money in the way we are doing,' he grumbled to Marthe. 'I'll be bound you are giving it all to those young hussies of yours. But it's quite sufficient for you to waste your time over them. Listen to me, my dear. I will give you a hundred francs a month for housekeeping, and if you will persist in giving money to girls who don't deserve it, you must save it out of your dress allowance.'

He kept firmly to his word, and the very next month he refused to let Marthe buy a pair of boots on the pretext that it would disarrange his accounts, and that he had given her full notice and warning. One evening his wife found him weeping bitterly in their bedroom. All her kindness of heart was aroused, and she clasped him in her arms and besought him to tell her what distressed him. But he roughly tore himself away from her and told her that he was not crying at all, but simply had a bad headache. It was that, said he, which made his eyes red.

'Do you think,' he exclaimed, 'that I am such a simpleton as you are to cry?'

She felt much hurt. The next day Mouret affected great gaiety; but some days afterwards, when Abbé Faujas and his mother came downstairs after dinner, he refused to play his usual game of piquet. He did not feel clear-headed enough for it, he said. On the next few nights he made other excuses, and so the games were broken off, and everyone went out on the terrace. Mouret seated himself in front of his wife and the Abbé, doing all he could to speak as much and as frequently as possible; while Madame Faujas sat a few yards away in the gloom, quite silent and still, with her hands upon her knees, like one of those legendary figures keeping guard over a treasure with the stern fidelity of a crouching dog.

'Fine evening!' Mouret used to say every night. 'It is much pleasanter here than in the dining-room. It is very wise of you to come out and enjoy the fresh air. Ah! there's a shooting-star! Did your reverence see it? I've heard say that it's Saint Peter lighting his pipe up yonder.'

He laughed, but Marthe kept quite grave, vexed by his attempts at pleasantry, which spoilt her enjoyment of the expanse of sky that spread between Monsieur Rastoil's pear-trees and the chestnuts of the Sub-Prefecture. Sometimes he would pretend to be unaware that she conformed with the requirements of religion, and he would take the Abbé aside and tell him that he relied on him to effect the salvation of the whole house. At other times he could never begin a sentence without saying in a bantering tone, 'Now that my wife goes to confession—' Then having grown tired of this subject, he began to listen to what was being said in the neighbouring gardens, trying to catch the faint sounds of voices which rose in the calm night air, as the distant noises of Plassans were hushed.

'Ah! those are the voices of Monsieur de Condamin and Doctor Porquier!' he said, straining his ear towards the Sub-Prefecture. 'They are making fun of the Paloques. Did you hear Monsieur Delangre saying in his falsetto, "Ladies, you had better come in, the air is growing cool"? Don't you think that little Delangre always talks as though he had swallowed a reed-pipe?'

Then he turned his head towards the Rastoils' garden.

'They haven't anyone there to-night,' he said; 'I can't hear anything. Ah, yes! those big geese the daughters are by the waterfall. The elder one talks just as though she were gobbling pebbles. Every evening they sit there jabbering for a good hour. They can't want all that time to tell each other about the matrimonial offers they have had. Ah! they are all there! There's Abbé Surin, with a voice like a flute; and Abbé Fenil, who would do for a rattle on Good Friday. There are sometimes a score of them huddled together, without stirring a finger, in that garden. I believe they all go there to listen to what we say.'

While he went chattering on in this manner Abbé Faujas and Marthe merely spoke a few words, chiefly in reply to his questions. Generally they sat apart from him with their faces raised to the sky and their eyes gazing into space. One evening Mouret fell asleep. Then, inclining their heads towards each other, they began to talk in subdued tones; while some few yards away, Madame Faujas, with her hands upon her knees, her eyes wide open and her ears on the strain, yet never seeing or hearing anything, seemed to be keeping watch for them.

X

The summer passed away, and Abbé Faujas seemed in no hurry to derive any advantage from his increasing popularity. He still kept himself in seclusion at the Mourets', delighting in the solitude of the garden, to which he now came down during the day-time. He read his breviary as he slowly walked with bent head up and down the green arbour at the far end. Sometimes he would close his book, still further slacken his steps, and seem to be buried in deep reverie. Mouret, who used to watch him, at last became impatient and irritated at seeing that black figure walking to and fro for hours together behind his fruit-trees.

'One has no privacy left,' he muttered. 'I can't lift my eyes now without catching sight of that cassock. He is like a crow, that fellow there, with his round eyes that always seem to be on the look-out for something. I don't believe in his fine disinterested airs.'

It was not till early in September that the Home of the Virgin was completed. In the provinces workmen are painfully slow; though it must be stated that the lady patronesses had twice upset Monsieur Lieutaud's designs in favour of ideas of their own. When the committee took possession of the building they rewarded the architect for the complaisance he had manifested by lavishing the highest praises upon him. Everything seemed to them perfectly satisfactory. The rooms were large, the communications were excellent, and there was a courtyard planted with trees and embellished with two small fountains. Madame de Condamin was particularly charmed with the façade, which was one of her own ideas. Over the door, the words 'Home of the Virgin' were carved in gold letters on a slab of black marble.

On the occasion of the opening of the Home there was a very affecting ceremony. The Bishop, attended by the Chapter, came in person to install the Sisters of Saint Joseph, who had been authorised to work the institution. A troop of some fifty girls of from eight to fifteen years of age had been collected together from the streets of the old quarter of the town, and all that had been required from the parents to obtain admission for their children had been a declaration that their avocations necessitated their absence from home during the entire day. Monsieur Delangre made a speech which was much applauded. He explained at considerable length, and in a magnificent style, the details and arrangements of this new refuge, which he called 'the school of virtue and labour, where young and interesting creatures would be kept safe from wicked temptations.' A delicate allusion, towards the end of the speech, to the real promoter of the Home, Abbé Faujas, attracted much notice. The Abbé was present amongst the other priests, and his fine, grave face remained perfectly calm and tranquil when all eyes were turned upon him. Marthe blushed on the platform, where she was sitting in the midst of the lady patronesses.

When the ceremony was over, the Bishop expressed a desire to inspect the building in every detail; and, notwithstanding the evident annoyance of Abbé Fenil, he sent for Abbé Faujas, whose big black eyes had never for a moment quitted him, and requested him to be good enough to act as his guide, adding aloud with a smile, that he was sure he could not find a better one. This little speech was circulated amongst the departing spectators, and in the evening all Plassans commented upon the Bishop's favourable demeanour towards Abbé Faujas.

The lady patronesses had reserved for themselves one of the rooms in the Home. Here they provided a collation for the Bishop, who ate a biscuit and drank two sips of Malaga, while saying a polite word or two to each of them. This brought the pious festival to a happy conclusion, for both before and during the ceremony there had been heart-burnings and rivalries among the ladies, whom the delicate praises of Monseigneur Rousselot quite restored to good humour. When they were left to themselves, they declared that everything had gone off exceedingly well, and they profusely praised the Bishop. Madame Paloque alone looked sour. The prelate had somehow forgotten her when he was distributing his compliments.

'You were quite right,' she said in a fury to her husband, when she got home again; 'I have just been made a convenience in that silly nonsense of theirs. It's a fine idea, indeed, to bring all those corrupt hussies together. I have given up all my time to them, and that big simpleton of a Bishop, who trembles before his own clergy, can't even say thank you. Just as if that Madame de Condamin had done anything, indeed. She is far too much occupied in showing off her dresses! Ah! we know quite enough about her, don't we? The world will hear something about her one of these days that will surprise it a little! Thank goodness, we've nothing to conceal. And that Madame Delangre and Madame Rastoil, too—well, it wouldn't be difficult to tell tales about them that would cover them with blushes! And they never stirred out of their drawing-rooms, they haven't taken half the trouble about the matter that I have! Then there's that Madame Mouret, with her pretence of managing the whole business, though she really did nothing but hang on to the cassock of her Abbé Faujas! She's another hypocrite of whom we shall hear some pretty things one of these days! And yet they could all get a polite speech, while there wasn't a word for me! I'm nothing but a mere convenience, they treat me like a dog! But things sha'n't go on like this, Paloque, I tell you. The dog will turn and bite them before long!'

From that time forward Madame Paloque showed herself much less accommodating. She became very irregular in her secretarial work, and declined to perform any duties that she did not fancy, till at last the lady patronesses began to talk of employing a paid secretary. Marthe mentioned these worries to Abbé Faujas and asked him if he could recommend a suitable man.

'Don't trouble yourself to look for anyone,' he said, 'I dare say I can find you a fit person. Give me two or three days.'

For some time past he had been frequently receiving letters bearing the Besançon postmark, They were all in the same handwriting, a large, ugly hand. Rose, who took them up to him, remarked that he seemed vexed at the mere sight of the envelopes.

'He looks quite put out,' she said. 'You may depend upon it that it's no great favourite of his who writes to him so often.'

Mouret's old curiosity was roused by this correspondence. One day he took up one of the letters himself with a pleasant smile, telling the Abbé, as an excuse for his own appearance, that Rose was not in the house. The Abbé probably saw through Mouret's cunning, for he assumed an expression of great pleasure, as though he had been impatiently expecting the letter. But Mouret did not allow himself to be deceived by this piece of acting, he stayed outside the door on the landing and glued his ear to the key-hole.

'From your sister again, isn't it?' asked Madame Faujas, in her hard voice. 'Why does she worry you in that way?'

There was a short silence, after which came a sound of paper being roughly crumpled, and the Abbé said, with evident displeasure: