"A woman," he said to himself, "who has been as familiar as Rose has been, or even much less familiar, ought to be one who has surrendered herself. Perhaps she might make me wait a few days more, but she would belong to me, she would let her eyes confess it and her lips would speak it out. Such a woman would even be disposed to hasten the coming of the delightful moment, if I had not the wit to prepare it myself. Rose, being a young girl and having only the dimmest presentiments of the truth, does not know how to hasten our happiness; otherwise she most certainly would hasten it. She belongs, then, to me. The question to be answered is this: shall I go on smelling the rose on the tree, or shall I pluck it?" The poetical quality of this metaphor seemed to him perhaps a little flabby. He began to speak to himself, without actually articulating the words, even in a whisper, in more precise terms. "Well, then, if I take her, I shall keep her. I have never thought of marrying, but it's no good going against the current of one's life. It may be happiness. Shall I lay up this regret for my old age: happiness passed dose to me, smiling to my desire, and my eyes remained dull and my mouth dumb? Happiness? Is it certain? Happiness is always uncertain. Unhappiness too. And the fusing of these two elements makes a dull insipid mixture." This commonplace idea occupied him for a while. Every joy is transient, and when it has passed one finds oneself numb and neutral once again. "Neutral, or below neutral? A woman of this temperament? I can still tame her? Yes, but what will happen ten years hence, when she is thirty? Ah, well, till then...!" M. Des Boys carried off Encoignard into his study. Left alone, Rose and M. Hervart had soon vanished behind the trees and shrubberies, had soon crossed the stream. They almost ran. "Here we are at home," said Rose and, very calmly, she offered her lips to M. Hervart. "She's positively conjugal already," thought M. Hervart. Nevertheless, this kiss disturbed his equanimity--the more so since Rose, in gratitude no doubt to M. Hervart for his defence of her old garden, kept her mouth a long time pressed to his. She was growing breathless and her breasts rose under her thin white blouse. M. Hervart was tempted to touch them. He made bold, and his gesture was received without indignation. They looked at one another anxious to speak but finding no words. Their mouths came together once more. M. Hervart pressed Rose's breast, and a small hand squeezed his other hand. It was a perilous moment. Realising this, M. Hervart tried to put an end to the contact. But the little hand squeezed his own more tightly and in a convulsive movement her knee came into contact with his leg. The tension was broken. Their hands were loosened, they drew away from one another, and for the first time after a kiss, Rose shut her eyes. M. Hervart felt a pain in the back of his neck.