I feel that he does not wish to speak. Nevertheless I insist: "It depends on what?" He hesitates to answer; then, in a mysterious and, at the same time, somewhat excited tone, he says: "On a certain matter; on a very important matter." "But what matter?" "Oh! on a certain matter, that's all." This is uttered in a brusque voice,--a voice not of anger exactly, but of impatience. He refuses to explain further. He says nothing to me of myself. This astonishes me, and causes me a painful disappointment. Can he have changed his mind? Has my curiosity, my hesitation, wearied him? Yet it is very natural that I should be interested in an event in the success or failure of which I am to share. Can the suspicion that I have not been able to hide, my suspicion of the outrage committed by him upon the little Claire, have caused Joseph to reflect further, and brought about a rupture between us? But I feel from the tremor of my heart that my resolution, deferred out of coquetry, out of a disposition to tease, was well taken. To be free, to be enthroned behind a bar, to command others, to know that one is looked at, desired, adored by so many men! And that is not to be? And this dream is to escape me, as all the others have? I do not wish to seem to be throwing myself at Joseph's head, but I wish to know what he has in his mind. I put on a sad face, and I sigh: "When you have gone, Joseph, the house will no longer be endurable to me. I have become so accustomed to you now, to our conversations." "Oh! indeed!" "I too shall go away." Joseph says nothing. He walks up and down the harness-room, with anxious brow and preoccupied mind, his hands nervously twirling a pair of garden-shears in the pocket of his blue apron. The expression of his face is unpleasant. I repeat, as I watch him go back and forth: "Yes, I shall go away; I shall return to Paris." He utters not a word of protest, not a cry; not even an imploring glance does he turn upon me. He puts a stick of wood in the stove, as the fire is low, and then begins again his silent promenade up and down the room. Why is he like this? Does he, then, accept this separation? Does he want it? Has he, then, lost his confidence in me, the love that he had for me? Or does he simply fear my imprudence, my eternal questions? Trembling a little, I ask him: "Will it cause you no pain, Joseph, if we do not see each other again?" Without halting in his walk, without even glancing at me out of the corner of his eye, in the manner so characteristic of him, he says: "Of course. But what can you expect? One cannot oblige people to do what they refuse to do. A thing either pleases, or it does not please." "What have I refused to do, Joseph?" "And besides, you are always full of bad ideas about me," he continues, without answering my question. "Why do you say that?" "Because...."