"Have you finished blowing me up?"

"I am not blowing you up."

"Oh, well, that's cool. Let's make it up now, shall we?" and, standing on tip-toes, Bijou held her pretty face up, saying, "Kiss me?"

He stepped back abruptly.

"Oh!" exclaimed Bijou, in surprise, and looking hurt, "you won't kiss me?"

Paul de Rueille had been so taken aback, that he could scarcely find any words.

"It isn't that I won't, but--well, not here like that, it is so absurd! I cannot understand your not seeing how ridiculous it is."

Bijou shook her rough head, and the loose curls over her forehead danced about.

"No, I do not see that it is at all ridiculous," and then, instead of going any farther, she turned round, and they went back to the house without another word.

On going up into his room, M. de Rueille found his wife reading a letter.

"I have just heard from Dr. Brice," she said, handing him the letter.

"It seemed to me that Marcel had not been well just lately."

"Not well--Marcel? Why the child eats and drinks more than I do. He sleeps like a top, too, and grows like a mushroom. Oh, that's good, that is! And what disease has he discovered in the boy--our excellent Brice?"

"No disease at all!"

"Oh, well, that's lucky!

"But he orders him to have sea-air."

"Sea-air for a lad who is in such downright good health that it positively makes him unbearable, he is so riotous?"

"Read what he says."

"Let me see what he says," murmured M. de Rueille, putting on a look of resignation, as he began to read the long letter, in which the doctor advised sea-air as the best remedy for the child in his present nervous state.

"And so he is in a nervous state?" said M. de Rueille jeeringly; "and on account of this, which no one, by the bye, except you, has noticed, we are to leave Bracieux, where the lad is flourishing in this delightful fresh air--it is his native air, in fact--and we are to go and take up our abode at some stupid seaside place? Oh, no! You really do get hold of some ridiculous ideas sometimes."

He was still irritated after his discussion with Bijou, and the idea of going away from her now caused him to speak in a harsh, dry way. He tried to laugh, too, but his laugh sounded forced and hollow.

Bertrade looked at him as she said gently:

"I did not want to tell you the truth straight out; I hoped that you would guess it. Do you not guess?"

"No, not at all," he answered, with a vague feeling of uneasiness.

"Well, then, you were right just now; not only Marcel, and his brothers too, for that matter, are better at Bracieux than anywhere else, but he has nothing the matter with him."

As M. de Rueille looked surprised, she continued, in a tranquil way:

"It is Marcel's father who is not quite himself, who needs a change of air, and who will, I am sure, decide on having a change."

"Well, really," he stammered out, "I do not know what you mean."

"I mean that you must leave Bracieux for a time," she answered, speaking very distinctly.

"Do you particularly wish me to tell you why?"

"I do."

"You are unwise to insist. You know that in a general way I never interfere in anything that you choose to do, or leave undone."

"Yes, you have always been very sweet and very sensible about everything," said M. de Rueille, "and I thoroughly appreciate--"

"Oh, there is no need to say anything about all that. I have always left you quite free to act in every way as you preferred, and now, in this matter, I do not bear you any ill-feeling whatever, and I should never have spoken to you of it if I had not seen that you are going too far. I have confidence in you, so that I know you will be on your guard; but I know how fascinating Bijou is, and I can see perfectly well that, next to poor young Giraud, you are the one who is the most infatuated."

"Yes, you are quite right, I am infatuated; but, as you say yourself, there is no danger whatever, and whether I go away, or whether I stay here, it is all the same; that will make no difference whatever."

"Yes! if you stay you will certainly make yourself ridiculous, and probably wretched, too. I am speaking to you now just as a friend might. Let us go away; believe me, it would be better."

"Well, but when we came back again--for we should come back, shouldn't we? in two months at the latest--things would, be exactly as they were before."

"No, it would be quite different," she answered carelessly. "In two months' time she will be married, or nearly so."

"Married!" exclaimed M. de Rueille, astounded. "Married! Jean is going to marry her, then?"

"Why, no! Jean is not going to marry her. He's another one who would do well to make himself scarce."

"Well, if it is not Jean, I do not see--it is not Henry, I presume?"

"No, not Henry either. He understands perfectly well that, with what he has, he cannot marry Bijou."

"Well, who is it, then? Who is it?"

"Why, no one at all--that is, no one in particular."

"You spoke, on the contrary, as though you were affirming something that was quite settled. You said: _In two months' time she will be married, or nearly so_. What did you mean by that? Why don't you want to tell me? You have been told not to? It is a secret?"

"No, it is merely a supposition, I a.s.sure you, that is all."

"And this supposition you will not tell me?"

"No."

After a short silence Madame de Rueille began again:

"I showed grandmamma the doctor's letter; she is very sorry about our going away. She adores the children, and then, too, she likes to have the house full at Bracieux."

"And she let herself be gulled with this story about Marcel's nervous condition? I am surprised at that; she is so sharp!"