And he had answered:  “It is not that I am fatigued; but Saudres has perhaps woke up now.”

And she had said:  “If you are afraid of my husband’s being awake, that is another thing.  Let us return.”

In returning she remained silent and leaned no longer on his arm.  Why?

At that time it had never occurred to him to ask himself “why.”  Now he seemed to apprehend something that he had not then understood.

What was it?

M. Savel felt himself blush, and he got up at a bound, feeling thirty years younger, believing that he now understood Madame Saudres then to say, “I love you.”

Was it possible!  That suspicion which had just entered his soul, tortured him.  Was it possible that he could not have seen, not have dreamed!

Oh! if that could be true, if he had rubbed against such good fortune without laying hold of it!

He said to himself:  “I wish to know.  I cannot remain in this state of doubt.  I wish to know!” He put on his clothes quickly, dressed in hot haste.  He thought:  “I am sixty-two years of age, she is fifty-eight; I may ask her that now without giving offense.”

He started out.

The Saudres’s house was situated on the other side of the street, almost directly opposite his own.  He went up to it, knocked, and a little servant came to open the door.

“You there at this hour, ill, Savel!  Has some accident happened to you?”

M. Savel responded: 

“No, my girl; but go and tell your mistress that I want to speak to her at once.”

“The fact is, Madame is preparing her stock of pear-jams for the winter, and she is standing in front of the fire.  She is not dressed, as you may well understand.”

“Yes, but go and tell her that I wish to see her on an important matter.”

The little servant went away, and Savel began to walk, with long, nervous strides, up and down the drawing-room.  He did not feel himself the least embarrassed, however.  Oh! he was merely going to ask her something, as he would have asked her about some cooking receipt, and that was:  “Do you know that I am sixty-two years of age!”

The door opened; and Madame appeared.  She was now a gross woman, fat and round, with full cheeks, and a sonorous laugh.  She walked with her arms away from her body, and her sleeves tucked up to the shoulders, her bare arms all smeared with sugar juice.  She asked, anxiously: 

“What is the matter with you, my friend; you are not ill, are you?”

“No, my dear friend; but I wish to ask you one thing, which to me is of the first importance, something which is torturing my heart, and I want you to promise that you will answer me candidly.”

She laughed, “I am always candid.  Say on.”

“Well, then.  I have loved you from the first day I ever saw you.  Can you have any doubt of this?”

She responded, laughing, with something of her former tone of voice.