“I have reflected, and what you say proves better than anything that I do not deceive myself.  I want a wife who loves me, and you are that wife.”

“More than I can tell you at this moment, wild with happiness, but not more than I shall prove to you in the continuance of our love.”

“Besides, dearest, do not have any illusions on the splendors of this position of which you speak; it is more than probable that they will never be realized, for I am not a man of money, and will do nothing to gain any.  If it does not come by itself—­”

“It will come.”

“That is not the object for which I work.  What I wish I have obtained partly; if now I make money and obtain a rich practice, the jealousy of my confreres will make me lose, or wait too long, for what my ambition prefers to a fortune.  For the moment this position will be modest; my four thousand francs of salary, that which I gain at the central bureau while waiting to have the title of hospital physician, and five hundred francs a month more that my editor offers me for work and a review of bacteriology, will give us nearly twelve thousand francs, and we must content ourselves with that for some time.”

“That is a fortune to me.”

“To me also; but I thought I ought to tell you.”

“And when do you wish our marriage to take place?”

“Immediately after the necessary legal delay, and as soon as I am settled in a new apartment; for you could not come here as my wife, where you have been seen so often.  It would not be pleasant for you or for me.”

“And we will not be so foolish as to put ourselves in the hands of an upholsterer; the first one cost enough.”

He said these last words with fierce energy, but continued immediately: 

“What do we need?  A parlor for the patients, if they come; an office for me, which will do also as a laboratory; a bedroom for us, and one for your mother.”

“You wish—­”

“But certainly.  Do you think that I would ask you to separate from her?”

She took his hand, and kissing it with a passionate impulse:  “Oh, the dearest, the most generous of men!”

“Do not let us talk of that,” he said with evident annoyance.  “In your mother’s condition of mental prostration it would kill her to be left alone; she needs you, and I promise to help you to soften her grief.  We will make her comfortable; and although my nature is not very tender, I will try to replace him from whom she is separated.  It will be a happiness to her to see you happy.”

For a long time he enlarged upon what he wished, feeling a sentiment of satisfaction in talking of what he would do for Madame Cormier, in whom at this time he saw the mother of Florentin more than that of Phillis.

“Do you think you can make her forget?” he asked from time to time.

“Forget?  No.  Neither she nor I can ever forget; but it is certain our sorrow will be drowned in our happiness, and this happiness we shall owe to you.  Oh, how you will be adored, respected, blessed!”