“But,” queried Frantz with some anxiety, “have you invented this Press of yours yet, or are you still hunting for it?”

“Invented!—­perfected!  To-morrow I will show you all my plans.  I have also invented an automatic crane for hanging the paper on the rods in the drying-room.  Next week I intend to take up my quarters in the factory, up in the garret, and have my first machine made there secretly, under my own eyes.  In three months the patents must be taken out and the Press must be at work.  You’ll see, my little Frantz, it will make us all rich-you can imagine how glad I shall be to be able to make up to these Fromonts for a little of what they have done for me.  Ah! upon my word, the Lord has been too good to me.”

Thereupon he began to enumerate all his blessings.  Sidonie was the best of women, a little love of a wife, who conferred much honor upon him.  They had a charming home.  They went into society, very select society.  The little one sang like a nightingale, thanks to Madame Dobson’s expressive method.  By the way, this Madame Dobson was another most excellent creature.  There was just one thing that disturbed poor Risler, that was his incomprehensible misunderstanding with Sigismond.  Perhaps Frantz could help him to clear up that mystery.

“Oh! yes, I will help you, brother,” replied Frantz through his clenched teeth; and an angry flush rose to his brow at the idea that any one could have suspected the open-heartedness, the loyalty, that were displayed before him in all their artless spontaneity.  Luckily he, the judge, had arrived; and he proposed to restore everything to its proper place.

Meanwhile, they were drawing near the house at Asnieres.  Frantz had noticed at a distance a fanciful little turreted affair, glistening with a new blue slate roof.  It seemed to him to have been built expressly for Sidonie, a fitting cage for that capricious, gaudy-plumaged bird.

It was a chalet with two stories, whose bright mirrors and pink-lined curtains could be seen from the railway, shining resplendent at the far end of a green lawn, where an enormous pewter ball was suspended.

The river was near at hand, still wearing its Parisian aspect, filled with chains, bathing establishments, great barges, and multitudes of little, skiffs, with a layer of coaldust on their pretentious, freshly-painted names, tied to the pier and rocking to the slightest motion of the water.  From her windows Sidonie could see the restaurants on the beach, silent through the week, but filled to overflowing on Sunday with a motley, noisy crowd, whose shouts of laughter, mingled with the dull splash of oars, came from both banks to meet in midstream in that current of vague murmurs, shouts, calls, laughter, and singing that floats without ceasing up and down the Seine on holidays for a distance of ten miles.