Occasionally Father Dumény would come in for an hour's chat. He was a large-framed, heavy man, with deep gray eyes shaded by enormous eyebrows that moved up and down as he spoke. He spoke as he walked, slowly and lumberingly, and he had a quaint humor that used to delight Blanche and puzzle Jules. When he appeared, she always brightened, and she liked to hear his doleful accounts of his rheumatism. He seemed to find humor in everything, even in his arduous duties and his ailments. "Ah, my children," he would say, "why should any one go to the theatre for pleasure? This life is nothing but a comedy, if you only look at it in the right way." From Blanche he derived a great deal of amusement; that she should perform in a circus always seemed a joke to him, and he was continually making fun over it. He had never been at a circus; so, though he had baptized Blanche and had met her during her visits in Boulogne, he had never seen her perform. Once when Jules showed him a photograph of Blanche as she appeared while posing on the rope, he rolled his eyes and pretended to be much shocked, and they all laughed together. "I suppose you two people will be leaving this nest of yours before winter comes," he said one night. "You've made your plans already, haven't you?" Jules looked down at Blanche, but she avoided his eyes. "We haven't decided definitely," Jules replied, "but we think of going to London." Blanche sighed, and Father Dumény glanced at her quickly and then smiled up at Jules. "She has a notion that she isn't going to live," Jules added, nodding at his wife. "Ridiculous, isn't it?" Father Dumény put his hands to his sides, and for a moment his great body shook with laughter. "Why, I expect to baptize at least half a dozen of your children! In a few years we shall see them trotting around here in Boulogne and coming to my Sunday-school to be prepared for their first communion. We need all the good Catholics we can have, in these days, to fight against the infidelity that's ruining the country. Ah, my dear child," he said, patting Blanche's hand, "when you're a grandmother with a troop of children around you, you'll look back and smile at these foolish little fears." After that night he came oftener, and kept Blanche laughing with his gayety. "When you go to London," he said one evening, "I shall give you letters to some dear English friends of mine,--Mr. and Mrs. Tate. I met the Tates when I was in Paris visiting Father Brémont more than ten years ago. Mr. Tate represented the banking-house of Welling Brothers, of London, there, and now he's in London as a member of the firm, I believe. You'll like Mrs. Tate, my dear. She's a good soul, and she speaks French almost as well as English. I shall expect to hear that you've become great friends." "But we aren't sure of going to England yet," Blanche replied with a weary smile. "Perhaps we shall go to America," Jules laughed. "I want Blanche to see the country."