“Some chicken with flageolets.”

He lost his temper:  “Chicken! chicken! always chicken!  By all that’s holy, I’ve had enough chicken!  Have you no ideas in your head, that you make me eat chicken every day?”

She answered, in a resigned tone:  “But, my dear, you know that the doctor has ordered it for you.  It’s the best thing for your stomach.  If your stomach were well, I could give you many things which I do not dare set before you now.”

Then, exasperated, he planted himself in front of Alexandre, exclaiming:  “Well, if my stomach is out of order it’s the fault of that brute.  For thirty-five years he has been poisoning me with his abominable cooking.”

Madame Maramballe suddenly turned about completely, in order to see the old domestic.  Their eyes met, and in this single glance they both said “Thank you!” to each other.

THE LOG

The drawing-room was small, full of heavy draperies and discreetly fragrant.  A large fire burned in the grate and a solitary lamp at one end of the mantelpiece threw a soft light on the two persons who were talking.

She, the mistress of the house, was an old lady with white hair, but one of those old ladies whose unwrinkled skin is as smooth as the finest paper, and scented, impregnated with perfume, with the delicate essences which she had used in her bath for so many years.

He was a very old friend, who had never married, a constant friend, a companion in the journey of life, but nothing more.

They had not spoken for about a minute, and were both looking at the fire, dreaming of no matter what, in one of those moments of friendly silence between people who have no need to be constantly talking in order to be happy together, when suddenly a large log, a stump covered with burning roots, fell out.  It fell over the firedogs into the drawing-room and rolled on to the carpet, scattering great sparks around it.  The old lady, with a little scream, sprang to her feet to run away, while he kicked the log back on to the hearth and stamped out all the burning sparks with his boots.

When the disaster was remedied, there was a strong smell of burning, and, sitting down opposite to his friend, the man looked at her with a smile and said, as he pointed to the log: 

“That is the reason why I never married.”

She looked at him in astonishment, with the inquisitive gaze of women who wish to know everything, that eye which women have who are no longer very young,—­in which a complex, and often roguish, curiosity is reflected, and she asked: 

“How so?”

“Oh, it is a long story,” he replied; “a rather sad and unpleasant story.

“My old friends were often surprised at the coldness which suddenly sprang up between one of my best friends whose Christian name was Julien, and myself.  They could not understand how two such intimate and inseparable friends, as we had been, could suddenly become almost strangers to one another, and I will tell you the reason of it.