“It’s a powerful and terrible body,” he cried, “but a body that allows itself to be clothed--it has armor which increases the power of the wearer beyond all expectation, a cuirass that multiplies its force and speed. Why, you inside it are like the Maritans of Mr. Wells in their tripod cylinders! You are nothing but the brain of an artificial monster that it makes one giddy to think of.” “All machines are like that, uncle.” “No. Not so completely. But for the form (which no animal resembles of course) the automobile is the most congruous automaton ever contrived. It is more made in our image than the best mannikin wound up by a key, the most human of puppets. For under their anthropomorphic envelope those mannikins hide a mere roasting-jack organism, which one would not compare with the anatomy of a snail. Whereas here....” He drew back a step and regarded my car with a look of tenderness: “What a superb creature,” he exclaimed, “and how great is man!” “Yes,” said I to myself, “there is a deal more beauty in a thing we create, than in all your sinister joining of flesh and wood that are both from of old. But it’s not bad on your part to have admitted it.” Though it was late, I went on to Grey-l’Abbaye to replenish my stock of petrol, and though he was a creature of routine, Lerne, infatuated with automobilism, passed beyond the traditional limit of his walks and insisted on accompanying me. Then we resumed the way to Fonval. My uncle, with all the ardor of a neophyte, bent over the bonnet in order to listen to the pulsations within the metal frame, then he took to pieces one of the oil-valves. All the time he kept questioning me, and I had to inform him of the smallest details of my car, details which he assimilated with an incredible accuracy. “I say, Nicolas, sound the hooter, will you? Now--go slow--stop--start again--quicker--that will do--put on the brake--back now--stop--it’s colossal!” He was laughing. His cloudy face seemed almost beautified. Seeing us one would have said we were excellent friends. In fact we were so then perhaps. And I fancied that perhaps, thanks to my “two-seater,” Lerne might one day confide in me. He preserved this gayety till our return to the _château_; the proximity of the mysterious workshop did not affect it; it only disappeared in the dining room. Then suddenly Lerne’s brow darkened. Emma had just come in. And the husband of my aunt Lidivine seemed to have effaced himself with my uncle’s smile, only an irritable old _savant_ remaining between his two guests. I then felt how little his future discoveries mattered in comparison with this woman, and that he wanted to acquire glory and wealth only in order to keep the charming girl by his side. Assuredly he loved her just as I did, and with the same fierce desire. * * * * *