Without paying any further attention to what her partner was saying, she looked with devouring curiosity at De Varades as though she had not met him for years. He was a handsome fellow, slenderly built, and muscular all over. The contrast in colour between his hair, which had become nearly white, and his moustache, which had remained very dark, gave a singular aspect to his refined head. A low forehead, a hooked nose, eyes that were somewhat too small and close together, and a flashing glance, in which bravery and temerity could alike be read, caused his countenance to be vaguely suggestive of the profile of a bird of prey. The stiffness, as of a uniform, assumed by the officer's evening coat, which he wore in a military style, was all that was further required to single him out and render him remarkable in an assembly wherein the wearied race of the men of desk and study was predominant. Since the audacious attempt at Bourges, Helen had never seen this disquieting individual coming towards her without feeling dimly uncomfortable, so sensible was she that in him she had an enemy capable of anything. And now, a prey to a maddening ulceration, she would on the contrary have liked him to approach her, to pay her attentions as he did formerly. Yes, to pay her attentions, and she would not be childish and silly as she had been before. In her misery and madness, she went so far as to regret her former behaviour! She had been a loyal wife, and what had this done for her? Only brought her to an hour when nothing in the world remained to her save an incurable wound in the most sensitive portion of her heart. She drank a few more drops of champagne in order to relieve her thoughts, and De Varades, off whom she never took her eyes, turned in her direction. Did he see her for the first time, or had he perhaps affected not to notice her? He bowed and came to greet her, with the expression at once ironical, respectful, and freezing, with which he used to accost her at Bourges; and instead of replying to it, as she did then, with equal coldness, she had a light in her eyes and a smile on her lips. She held out her hand to him, and after the first polite formulas, immediately asked: "Are you passing through Paris?" "No, madame, I am living here," he replied; "I was appointed professor at the School of War four months ago." "Four months, and you have not come to see us?" she said in a coquettishly reproachful tone of voice.