‘So let it be,’ said the landlord.  And then they finished their cigars in silence.

It was in vain that Adrian Urmand tried that night to obtain audience from Marie.  Marie, as though she well knew what was wanted of her and was determined to thwart her lover, would not allow herself to be found alone for a moment.  When Adrian presented himself at the window of her little bar, he found that Peter was with her, and she managed to keep Peter with her till Adrian was gone.  And again, when he hoped to find her alone for a few moments after the work of the day was over in the small parlour where she was accustomed to sit for some half hour before she would go up to her room, he was again disappointed.  She was already up-stairs with her aunt and the children, and all Michel Voss’s good nature in keeping out of the way was of no avail.

But Urmand was determined not to be beaten.  He intended to return to Basle on the next day but one, and desired to put this matter a little in forwardness before he took his departure.  On the following morning he had various appointments to keep with countrymen and their wives, who sold linen to him, but he was quick over his business and managed to get back to the inn early in the afternoon.  From six till eight he well knew that Marie would allow nothing to impede her in the grand work of preparing for supper; but at four o’clock she would certainly be sitting somewhere about the house with her needle in her hand.  At four o’clock he found her, not with her needle in her hand, but, better still, perfectly idle.  She was standing at an open window, looking out upon the garden as he came behind her, standing motionless with both hands on the sill of the window, thinking deeply of something that filled her mind.  It might be that she was thinking of him.

’I have done with my customers now, and I shall be off to Basle to-morrow,’ said he, as soon as she had looked round at the sound of his footsteps and perceived that he was close to her.

‘I hope you have bought your goods well, M. Urmand.’

’Ah! for the matter of that the time for buying things well is clean gone.  One used to be able to buy well; but there is not an old woman now in Alsace who doesn’t know as well as I do, or better, what linen is worth in Berne and Paris.  They expect to get nearly as much for it here at Granpere.’

’They work hard, M. Urmand, and things are dearer than they were.  It is well that they should get a price for their labour.’

’A price, yes:  —­but how is a man to buy without a profit?  They think that I come here for their sakes,—­merely to bring the market to their doors.’  Then he began to remember that he had no special object in discussing the circumstances of his trade with Marie Bromar, and that he had a special object in another direction.  But how to turn the subject was now a difficulty.

‘I am sure you do not buy without a profit,’ said Marie Bromar, when she found that he was silent.  ’And then the poor people, who have to pay so dear for everything!’ She was making a violent attempt to keep him on the ground of his customers and his purchases.