“And then, monsieur, business became better, and we were tranquil as to the future!  Then, you see, I do not exactly know what went on in my mind, no, I really do not know, but I began to dream like a little boarding-school girl.  The sight of the little carts full of flowers which are drawn about the streets made me cry; the smell of violets sought me out in my easy-chair, behind my cash box, and made my heart beat!  Then I would get up and go out on the doorstep to look at the blue sky between the roofs.  When one looks up at the sky from the street, it looks like a river which is descending on Paris, winding as it flows, and the swallows pass to and fro in it like fish.  These ideas are very stupid at my age!  But how can one help it, monsieur, when one has worked all one’s life?  A moment comes in which one perceives that one could have done something else, and that one regrets, oh! yes, one feels intense regret!  Just think, for twenty years I might have gone and had kisses in the woods, like other women.  I used to think how delightful it would be to lie under the trees and be in love with some one!  And I thought of it every day and every night!  I dreamed of the moonlight on the water, until I felt inclined to drown myself.

“I did not venture to speak to Monsieur Beaurain about this at first.  I knew that he would make fun of me, and send me back to sell my needles and cotton!  And then, to speak the truth, Monsieur Beaurain never said much to me, but when I looked in the glass, I also understood quite well that I no longer appealed to any one!

“Well, I made up my mind, and I proposed to him an excursion into the country, to the place where we had first become acquainted.  He agreed without mistrusting anything, and we arrived here this morning, about nine o’clock.

“I felt quite young again when I got among the wheat, for a woman’s heart never grows old!  And really, I no longer saw my husband as he is at present, but just as he was formerly!  That I will swear to you, monsieur.  As true as I am standing here I was crazy.  I began to kiss him, and he was more surprised than if I had tried to murder him.  He kept saying to me:  ’Why, you must be mad!  You are mad this morning!  What is the matter with you?’ I did not listen to him, I only listened to my own heart, and I made him come into the wood with me.  That is all.  I have spoken the truth, Monsieur le Maire, the whole truth.”

The mayor was a sensible man.  He rose from his chair, smiled, and said:  “Go in peace, madame, and when you again visit our forests, be more discreet.”

MARTINE

It came to him one Sunday after mass.  He was walking home from church along the by-road that led to his house when he saw ahead of him Martine, who was also going home.

Her father walked beside his daughter with the important gait of a rich farmer.  Discarding the smock, he wore a short coat of gray cloth and on his head a round-topped hat with wide brim.