So Cesaire Houlbreque went off with his whip under his arm, brooding over his own thoughts, and lifting up one after the other his heavy wooden shoes daubed with clay.  Certainly he desired to marry Celeste Levesque.  He wanted her with her child, because it was the woman he required.  He could not say why:  but he knew it, he was sure of it.  He had only to look at her to be convinced of it, to feel himself quite jolly, quite stirred up, as it were turned into a pure animal through contentment.  He even found a pleasure in kissing the little boy, Victor’s little boy, because he had come out of her.

And he gazed, without hate, at the distant profile of the man who was driving his plow along on the horizon’s edge.

But old Amable did not want this marriage.  He opposed it with the obstinacy of a deaf man, with a violent obstinacy.

Cesaire in vain shouted in his ear, in that ear which still heard a few sounds: 

“I’ll take good care of you, daddy.  I tell you she’s a good girl and strong, too, and also thrifty.”

The old man repeated: 

“As long as I live, I won’t see her your wife.”

And nothing could get the better of him, nothing could bend his severity.  One hope only was left to Cesaire.  Old Amable was afraid of the cure through apprehension of the death which he felt drawing nigh.  He had not much fear of the good God nor of the Devil nor of Hell nor of Purgatory, of which he had no conception, but he dreaded the priest, who represented to him burial, as one might fear the doctors through horror of diseases.  For the last eight days Celeste, who knew this weakness of the old man, had been urging Cesaire to go and find the cure; but Cesaire always hesitated, because he had not much liking for the black robe, which represented to him hands always stretched out for collections for blessed bread.

However, he made up his mind, and he proceeded towards the presbytery, thinking in what manner he would speak about his case.

The Abbe Raffin, a lively little priest, thin and never shaved, was awaiting his dinner-hour while warming his feet at his kitchen-fire.

As soon as he saw the peasant entering, he asked, merely turning round his head: 

“Well, Cesaire, what do you want?”

“I’d like to have a talk with you, M. le Cure.”

The man remained standing, intimidated, holding his cap in one hand and his whip in the other.

“Well, talk.”

Cesaire looked at the housekeeper, an old woman who dragged her feet while putting on the cover for her master’s dinner at the corner of the table in front of the window.

He stammered: 

“’Tis—­’tis a sort of confession.”

Thereupon, the Abbe Raffin carefully surveyed his peasant.  He saw his confused countenance, his air of constraint, his wandering eyes, and he gave orders to the housekeeper in these words: