"Well, well! call off your dog! Heavens and earth! Don't you see that he is biting me?"
Isaure called Vaillant, who made up his mind only with great reluctance to release the leg that he had seized, and returned to his mistress, growling, and keeping his flashing eyes fixed on the stranger.
"I beg pardon, monsieur," said Isaure, "but this faithful animal evidently thought you were threatening me."
"Morbleu! why do you shriek because I approach you? Do you think that I am going to eat you? What fools these girls are! You have a guardian there who does not understand joking; the rascal--his teeth went into my flesh. If he should receive your young men in the same way, I fancy that they would not come so often. But you don't shriek when they come near, do you?--Adieu, my pretty discreet one! Oh! I shall soon find out what you refuse to tell me to-day! Yes, I shall find out all about you. I do not believe that you are a witch; but I do not think it natural that you should talk like the ladies from the city, that you should live alone with your flocks, and that you should be rich enough to entertain for nothing all those who stop at your house. There is something underneath it, and I shall find out what it is; for as I have told you, it is not easy to deceive me, and I believe neither in the innocence which runs about fields, nor in Platonic love, nor in innate knowledge. Adieu."
The stranger took his hat and stick and walked slowly from the house, with a contemptuous glance at the girl. Isaure felt that she breathed more freely when she saw that man take his departure, and Vaillant, who had not ceased to growl since his brief struggle with the stranger, went to the door to look after him, and did not reenter the house until he was entirely out of sight.
NEW CHARACTERS.--A GRAND FÊTE AT LA ROCHE-NOIRE.
At last the great day had arrived on which Robineau proposed to display all the magnificence of a Caliph, although his fortune did not approach in size that of his highness's most insignificant pacha. But, after living for many years with the strictest economy, to become the owner of a château, to hear oneself called monseigneur, or Monsieur de la Roche-Noire, to have nine servants at one's orders, and to be fêted, sought after, flattered by men, and ogled and cajoled by women, is more than is necessary to make one lose one's head, especially when one has very little common sense and a great deal of vanity. So that Robineau had almost lost his head; he did not calculate, he did not reflect that the manner of life which he proposed to lead was infinitely beyond the income that he had inherited; he gave orders recklessly. But he was happy, he was fairly swimming in joy, and that is always something. How many people there are who, even with great wealth, can never succeed in being happy.