"Massigny! Massigny!" he burst forth with concentrated rage. "Can I never escape him?... No doubt the artist who painted this portrait painted another for Massigny.... What a fool I am to imagine for a moment that I am loved with a love equal to my own!... just because she put aside her jewels and wore a rose in her hair!... Jewels! why, she has a chest full.... Massigny, who thought of little else save a woman's toilette, was a lover of jewellery!... Yes, she has a gracious nature, it must be granted; she knows how to gratify the tastes of her lovers. Damn it! I would rather a hundred times that she were a courtesan and gave herself for money. Just because she was my mistress and unpaid I thought she loved me indeed." Soon another still more unhappy idea presented itself. In a few weeks' time the Countess would be out of mourning, and Saint-Clair had promised to marry her as soon as her year of widowhood was over. He had promised. Promised? No. He had never spoken of it, but such had been his intention and the Countess had understood it so. But for him this was as good as an oath. Last night he would have given a throne to hasten the time for acknowledging his love publicly; now the very thought of marrying the former mistress of Massigny filled him with loathing. "Nevertheless, I owe it to her to marry her," he said to himself, "and it shall be done. No doubt she thinks, poor woman, I heard all about her former _liaison_; it seems to have been generally known. Besides, she did not then know me.... She cannot understand me; she thinks that I am only such another lover as Massigny." Then he said to himself, and not without a certain pride-- "For three months she has made me the happiest man living; such happiness is worth the sacrifice of my life." He did not go to bed, but rode about among the woods the whole of the morning. In one of the pathways of the woods of Verrières he saw a man mounted on a fine English horse, who called him immediately by his name while he was still far off. It was Alphonse de Thémines. To a man in Saint-Clair's state of mind solitude is particularly desirable, and this encounter with Thémines changed his bad humour into a furious temper. Thémines did not notice his mood, or perhaps took a wicked pleasure in thwarting it. He talked and laughed and joked without noticing that he did not receive any response. Saint-Clair soon tried to turn his horse aside into a narrow track, hoping the bore would not follow him; but it was of no use, bores do not leave their prey so easily. Thémines pulled the bridle in the same direction, increased his horse's pace to keep by Saint-Clair's side and complacently continued the conversation.