It also seemed to him that she was growing prettier, more refined in her appearance, and that she devoted more attention to the care of her person. One day when she was handing him a cup of tea, he noticed that her hands were no longer the hands of a servant, but of a lady, with well-trimmed, clean nails, quite irreproachable. On another occasion he observed that the shoes that she wore were almost elegant in shape and material. Then she had gone up to her room one afternoon and come down wearing a delightful little gray dress, quite simple and in perfect taste. "Hallo!" he exclaimed, as he saw her, "how dressy you are getting to be, Elisabeth!" She blushed up to the whites of her eyes. "What, I, Monsieur? Why, no. I dress a little better because I have more money." "Where did you buy that dress that you have on?" "I made it myself, Monsieur." "You made it? When? I always see you busy at work about the house during the day." "Why, during my evenings, Monsieur." "But where did you get the stuff? and who cut it for you?" She told him that the shopkeeper at Montigny had brought her some samples from Fontainebleau, that she had made her selection from them, and paid for the goods out of the two louis that he had paid her as advanced wages. The cutting and fitting had not troubled her at all, for she and her mother had worked four years for a ready-made clothing house. He could not resist telling her: "It is very becoming to you. You look very pretty in it." And she had to blush again, this time to the roots of her hair. When she had left the room he said to himself: "I wonder if she is beginning to fall in love with me?" He reflected on it, hesitated, doubted, and finally came to the conclusion that after all it might be possible. He had been kind and compassionate toward her, had assisted her, and been almost her friend; there would be nothing very surprising in this little girl being smitten with the master, who had been so good to her. The idea did not strike him very disagreeably, moreover, for she was really very presentable, and retained nothing of the appearance of a servant about her. He experienced a flattering feeling of consolation, and his masculine vanity, that had been so cruelly wounded and trampled on and crushed by another woman, felt comforted. It was a compensation--trivial and unnoteworthy though it might be, it was a compensation--for when love comes to a man unsought, no matter whence it comes, it is because that man possesses the capacity of inspiring it. His unconscious selfishness was also gratified by it; it would occupy his attention and do him a little good, perhaps, to watch this young heart opening and beating for him. The thought never occurred to him of sending the child away, of rescuing her from the peril from which he himself was suffering so cruelly, of having more pity for her than others had showed toward him, for compassion is never an ingredient that enters into sentimental conquests.