Generally these outbursts of unblushing egotism amused Suzanne. She saw in them a conception of life whose pronounced materialism was far from displeasing her. But to-day she looked a little more closely at the Baron as he uttered his doctor's name, and sitting there with the lamp-light full upon his wrinkled face, his drooping moustache and his swollen eyelids, he looked so broken down and so fully his age that the hideousness of her own life suddenly burst upon her. It is a horrible thing for a young and beautiful woman to endure the caresses of a man she does not love, even when that man is young, full of passion and ardour. But when he is bordering on old age, when he pays for the right to pollute this fair woman whose love he cannot win, then it is prostitution so terrible that disgust gives way to sorrow. For the first time, perhaps, Desforges looked old in Suzanne's eyes, and by an irresistible impulse of her whole soul she called to mind, as a contrast, the fresh lips and fair young face of the man whose image had haunted her for the past two days. She felt how foolishly she had behaved in hesitating for an instant, and, being a person of determination, she commenced to act at once. She was now dressed, and having put on her bonnet and buttoned her gloves, she said to Desforges before tying on her veil, 'When are you coming to lunch with me? Once upon a time you often used to come without being asked--it was so nice of you.' 'To-morrow I can't,' he replied, 'nor the next day either, but the day after that----' 'Tuesday, then? That's an understood thing. And to-night I shall see you at Madame de Sermoises', sha'n't I?' 'Charming woman!' thought the Baron, as he was left alone. 'She might have so many adventures, and her only thought is of pleasing me.' 'The day after to-morrow, then, I am sure of being alone,' said Suzanne to herself as she swept along the pavement of the Rue du Mont-Thabor, casting cautious glances to the right and left, but with such art that her eyes scarcely seemed to move. 'But what excuse can I give René'--she already called him by that name in her thoughts--'to make him come? I know--I'll ask him to write a few lines on a copy of the "Sigisbée" that I'm going to send to a friend.'