"What is the proverb, madame?"

"As you don't know it, I won't tell you.--Now, we will proceed to the dessert; I had it put within our reach, so that we need not ring; all we have to do is to change tables. Don't you think that that is pleasanter?"

These last words were accompanied with such a tender glance that Cherubin was greatly confused; to recover his self-possession, he hastily pushed away the table on which they had breakfasted and replaced it by the smaller one on which the dessert was all set out.

Madame Celival, who was desirous that the breakfast should come to an end, made haste to serve her guest, and offered him everything. Cherubin scrutinized the compote of plums and asked:

"What is that?"

"Plums. Do you mean to say that you don't know this dish?"

"Mon Dieu! no, I never saw it before. At my nurse's we never ate it."

Madame Celival laughed heartily.

"At your nurse's!" she repeated; "that is lovely! an excellent joke! One would think, to hear you, that you had remained out at nurse to this day."

Cherubin bit his lips; he thought that he had made a foolish speech, and was overjoyed to find that she took it for a good joke. He accepted the plums which Madame Celival offered him.

"Well!" said the lovely widow, after a moment, "how do you like what you never had at your nurse's?"

"Very well! delicious!"

"Will you have some more?"

"With pleasure."

Madame Celival served him again to plums, and he said, as he ate them:

"But you are eating nothing, madame."

"Oh! I am not hungry."

"Why not?"

"Why not! what a strange question! Because women aren't like men, and when they have anything on their mind, they live on their thoughts and their feelings, and those are all they need."

These last words were uttered in a tone of annoyance, for Madame Celival was beginning to think that Cherubin pa.s.sed an unduly long time at the table; however, she continued to offer him the different dishes, like a woman of breeding, who knows how to do the honors of her house.

"Thanks," said Cherubin, "but I like the plums better than anything."

"Very well, take some more."

"Really--if I dared----"

"You are not going to stand on ceremony, are you? I shall be offended."

Cherubin remembered that he must not be timid, that it was that which had been so harmful to him. So he helped himself to plums; in a moment he took some more; and as Madame Celival laughed heartily over his pa.s.sion for plums, and he was delighted to entertain her, he did not stop until the dish contained no more.

The lovely widow seemed very well pleased when the plums were exhausted, and the words: "That is very lucky!" escaped from her lips; but they were almost inaudible, and Cherubin did not hear them.

Meanwhile the pretty hostess had softly moved her chair away from the table; she drank a few spoonfuls of coffee, placed her cup on the mantel, then resumed her seat on her couch, saying to the young man, in a voice that went to his heart:

"Well! aren't you coming to sit by me?"

Cherubin began to understand that the time had come when he must turn his attention to something besides plums; he left the table and walked about the salon, admiring divers lovely engravings, the subjects of which, while not too free, were well adapted to appeal to the pa.s.sions.

He went into ecstasies before Cupid and Psyche, the river Scamander, and an Odalisk lying on her couch; and finally he seated himself beside Madame Celival, who said to him:

"Do you like my engravings?"

"Yes, all those women are so lovely--especially the Odalisk!"

"The painter has hardly clothed her; but to enable us to admire her beauty, it was necessary to show her to us unclothed. That is allowed in painting; artists have privileges; we pardon everything in talent--or in love."

These last words were accompanied by a sigh. Cherubin looked at the lovely widow, and she had never seemed to him more alluring; for her eyes shone with a fire that was at once intense and soft, and her half-closed lips seemed inclined to reply to many questions. The young man ventured to take a hand which was relinquished to him without reserve; he gazed fondly at that soft, plump, white hand, with its tapering fingers; he dared not put it to his lips as yet, but he pressed it tenderly, and not only was it not withdrawn, but a very warm pressure responded to his. Encouraged by that symptom, Cherubin was about to cover that hand with kisses, when he suddenly felt a sharp pain in the intestinal region.

Cherubin was thunderstruck.

"What's the matter?" queried Madame Celival, amazed to find him holding her hand in the air, without kissing it.

"Nothing, oh! nothing, madame!"

And the young man tried to dissemble a wry face caused by a second pang, less sharp, it is true, but followed by internal rumblings which portended a violent tempest.

Meanwhile, being completely engrossed by his sensations, and disturbed by the thought of the possible sequel, Cherubin ceased to take any part in the conversation and dropped Madame Celival's hand on the couch.

"In heaven's name, what is the matter, monsieur?" murmured the pretty widow, in a half-reproachful, half-melting tone. "You seem distraught, absent-minded; you say nothing to me. Do you know that that is not agreeable on your part?"

"Mon Dieu, madame, I a.s.sure you that nothing is the matter; you are mistaken."

And Cherubin did what he could to mask another contortion; he was attacked by gripes which fairly tortured him; he realized that he had the colic, and not for anything on earth would he have had Madame Celival guess what had happened to him.

However, it is not a crime to feel indisposed! But we weak mortals, who seek sometimes to exalt ourselves to the rank of G.o.ds, we blush because we are subject to all the infirmities of the simplest of G.o.d's creatures; there are times when we are sorely embarra.s.sed to be at once the man of the world and the natural man. Poor Cherubin found himself in that predicament; the plums were playing him a very treacherous trick.

Madame Celival could not misunderstand the young marquis's tone. Piqued, too, because she could no longer read in his eyes either affection or desire, she exclaimed after a moment:

"Evidently, monsieur, you find it dull with me."

"Why, madame, I swear to you that that is not true--far from it; but----"

"But you would prefer to be with Madame de Valdieri, wouldn't you?"

"Oh, no! that is not where I would like to be at this moment!"

"Indeed! where would you like to be at this moment, monsieur?"

Cherubin did not know what to reply; he endured with difficulty another sharp pain, and felt the cold perspiration standing on his forehead. He cut a very sad figure at that moment, and did not in the least resemble a lover.