in Pierrette, was curious to know how it had been done.  And it thus came about that the austere priest, while preparing Pierrette for her first communion, also won to God the hitherto erring soul of Mademoiselle Sylvie.  Sylvie became pious.  Jerome Rogron, on whom the so-called Jesuit could get no grip (for just then the influence of His Majesty the late Constitutionnel the First was more powerful over weaklings than the influence of the Church), Jerome Rogron remained faithful to Colonel Gouraud, Vinet, and Liberalism.

Mademoiselle Rogron naturally made the acquaintance of Mademoiselle Habert, with whom she sympathized deeply.  The two spinsters loved each other as sisters.  Mademoiselle Habert offered to take Pierrette into her school to spare Sylvie the annoyance of her education; but the brother and sister both declared that Pierrette’s absence would make the house too lonely; their attachment to their little cousin seemed excessive.

When Gouraud and Vinet became aware of the advent of Mademoiselle Habert on the scene they concluded that the ambitious priest her brother had the same matrimonial plan for his sister that the colonel was forming for himself and Sylvie.

“Your sister wants to get you married,” said Vinet to Rogron.

“With whom?” asked Rogron.

“With that old sorceress of a schoolmistress,” cried the colonel, twirling his moustache.

“She hasn’t said anything to me about it,” said Rogron, naively.

So thorough an old maid as Sylvie was certain to make good progress in the way of salvation.  The influence of the priest would as certainly increase, and in the end affect Rogron, over whom Sylvie had great power.  The two Liberals, who were naturally alarmed, saw plainly that if the priest were resolved to marry his sister to Rogron (a far more suitable marriage than that of Sylvie to the colonel) he could then drive Sylvie in extreme devotion to the Church, and put Pierrette in a convent.  They might therefore lose eighteen months’ labor in flattery and meannesses of all sorts.  Their minds were suddenly filled with a bitter, silent hatred to the priest and his sister, though they felt the necessity of living on good terms with them in order to track their manoeuvres.  Monsieur and Mademoiselle Habert, who could play both whist and boston, now came every evening to the Rogrons.  The assiduity of the one pair induced the assiduity of the other.  The colonel and lawyer felt that they were pitted against adversaries who were fully as strong as they,—­a presentiment that was shared by the priest and his sister.  The situation soon became that of a battle-field.  Precisely as the colonel was enabling Sylvie to taste the unhoped-for joys of being sought in marriage, so Mademoiselle Habert was enveloping the timid Rogron in the cotton-wool of her attentions, words, and glances.  Neither side could utter that grand word of statesmanship, “Let us divide!” for each wanted the whole prey.