the theatre, but always with a third party; they skated together; they were seen in the parks; yet so careful was she of her reputation that a bishop could not have found fault with her. I thought at the start that she might be trying to get his money over the card-table—but here I was right down wrong, and don't believe he staked threepence the whole winter through. It's fair to say that she led him into no other extravagances. He spent less money that quarter than he had done for years—drank less, and was better tempered.
This is how the thing went on until March; and when that month came I had given it up as a mystery. It seemed to me that he was just in love with the creature's pretty face and pretty ways, and that was all you could say about it. I concluded that he would end by marrying her, and that I should find myself compelled either to serve a mistress—which I could never do—or to begin life afresh with what capital I had made in his service. In fact, I was just looking about to see what sort of a future I could make for myself, when he burst upon me with the news that we were going into the country, and that our destination was Brittany.
"It's not the time I'd be choosing to leave Paris," said he, "but we won't be away a month, and there'll be fun when we return. Ye must know that she's a great place in Brittany, at the woods of Folgöet it is, and we're to take the night train to Châteaulin on Monday. Will I be wanting clothes, do you think?"
