"Everybody is running to their doors and windows to see us pa.s.s, madame."

"Good! they are quite right!"

"Shall I bow, my dear?"

"I should say not! Why should you bow? Do you imagine yourself somebody of importance--a prefect--a general?"

"I am not, but I might be! Well, then, I will content myself with smiling at the people."

"No, no, monsieur; don't smile either, I beg you; it's not necessary."

"But I must do something."

"Look out for what you have on your knees; that's the best thing you can do."

"Ah! the landscape becomes positively enchanting. Are we approaching our property?"

"Yes, monsieur; look--on the right--you can see it from here."

"What! that magnificent house, with a terrace and jars of flowers?"

"Yes, monsieur."

"And that beautiful avenue of lindens in front is ours too?"

"To be sure; it goes with the house."

"And we are going to drive through that avenue?"

"Of course; would you prefer to fly over it?"

"Madame, I am dazzled--enchanted."

"Don't look so enchanted, monsieur; one would think that you never had seen anything before."

"But there's a gate at the end of the avenue; ah! it's open; is there somebody at the house?"

"There is the gardener, who acts as concierge too, and whom I have retained."

"Very good. Yes, I see a man by the gate; he expects us, no doubt."

"I sent him word that we should come to-day."

The caleche arrived at the gate, at which stood an old peasant with a rake over his shoulder, who bowed humbly to his new masters when their carriage turned into the avenue.

Chamoureau, bewildered by all that he saw, exclaimed:

"Why didn't he fire?"

"Fire what, monsieur?"

"His gun."

"In order to do that, he would have to have one."

"Wasn't that a gun over his shoulder?"

"No, monsieur, it was a rake."

"Oh! I thought it was a gun; a gun would have been better, for he could have fired it on our arrival."

"Once more, monsieur, remember that you are not the lord of the manor, that you should be received with a salvo of musketry!"

"That makes no difference, madame; a servant always has the right to discharge his gun when his masters come home."

"If all servants did that every time that their masters came home there would be an incessant fusillade everywhere."

At last the carriage drew up in front of a pretty stoop. The maid alighted; Chamoureau, who was in a hurry to inspect his property, attempted to do the same and dropped on the ground all the boxes and packages that he had on his knees.

Thereupon Thelenie made a great outcry and applied some far from complimentary epithets to her husband. To escape that deluge of abuse, the new proprietor darted up the steps, through the vestibule, up a flight of stairs, and disappeared.

Thelenie bade the maid pick up the boxes, which contained elaborately trimmed bonnets and caps--hence her wrath against her husband. They were all taken up to the apartment which madame had chosen for her own.

Mademoiselle Melie went into ecstasies over the elegance and convenient arrangement of the rooms, and the beauty of the view, while she dressed her mistress, who began operations by changing her costume; then the maid went to her own room.

Thelenie, alone in a dainty boudoir adjoining her bedroom, opened a window from which several of the houses in the village were visible, and glanced at them a moment, saying to herself:

"I shall soon know where Edmond lives, and those women whom he goes to see. Why should I not find out now?--Melie!"

The maid answered the call at once.

"Go and bring the concierge to me; if he is not downstairs, you will find him in the garden."

The concierge speedily obeyed his new mistress's summons.

"First of all, what is your name? I have forgotten it."

"Thoma.s.seau, madame, at your service."

"Tell me, Thoma.s.seau, do you know this country well?"

"Like my pocket, madame."

"There was a house, belonging to one Monsieur Courtivaux, which was purchased by a lady a few months ago?"

"Yes, yes--by Madame Dalmont; she took Poucette, Guillot's niece, into her service."

"That's the very one; and she has a young woman with her----"