"You mean to say for my pleasure, dear aunt." Théodule kissed her a second time, and she had the pleasure of having her neck slightly grazed by his gold-laced collar. "Are you travelling on horseback, with your regiment?" "No, my aunt: I have come to see you by special permission. My servant is leading my horse, and I shall travel by the diligence. By the way, there is one thing I want to ask you." "What is it?" "It appears that my cousin Marius Pontmercy is going on a journey too?" "How do you know that?" the aunt said, her curiosity being greatly tickled. "On reaching Paris I went to the coach-office to take my place in the _coupé_." "Well?" "A traveller had already taken a seat in the Impériale, and I saw his name in the way-bill: it was Marius Pontmercy." "Oh, the scamp!" the aunt exclaimed. "Ah! your cousin is not a steady lad like you. To think that he is going to pass the night in a diligence!" "Like myself." "You do it through duty, but he does it through disorder." "The deuce!" said Théodule. Here an event occurred to Mlle. Gillenormand the elder: she had an idea. If she had been a man she would have struck her forehead. She addressed Théodule. "You are aware that your cousin does not know you?" "I have seen him, but he never deigned to notice me." "Where is the diligence going to?" "To Andelys." "Is Marius going there?" "Unless he stops on the road, like myself. I get out at Vernon, to take the Gaillon coach. I know nothing about Marius's route." "Marius! what an odious name! What an idea it was to call him that! Well, your name, at least, is Théodule." "I would rather it was Alfred," the officer said. "Listen, Théodule; Marius absents himself from the house." "Eh, eh!" "He goes about the country." "Ah, ah!" "He sleeps out." "Oh, oh!" "We should like to know the meaning of all this." Théodule replied, with the calmness of a bronze man, "Some petticoat!" And with that inward chuckle which evidences a certainty, he added, "a girl!" "That is evident!" the aunt exclaimed, who believed that she heard M. Gillenormand speaking, and who felt his conviction issue irresistibly from that word "girl," accentuated almost in the same way by grand-uncle and grand-nephew. She continued,-- "Do us a pleasure by following Marius a little. As he does not know you, that will be an easy matter. Since there is a girl in the case, try to get a look at her, and write and tell us all about it, for it will amuse grandfather." Théodule had no excessive inclination for this sort of watching, but he was greatly affected by the ten louis, and he believed he could see a possible continuation of such gifts. He accepted the commission, and said, "As you please, aunt," and added in an aside, "I am a Duenna now!" Mlle. Gillenormand kissed him.