"If it was your own opinion, my dear friend, I would accept it with pleasure; but why should I care for what Mme. Bricourt says? I know I am an atheist, a materialist, and spoiled by reading too much. People tell all sorts of stories about me. My father brought me up according to his ideas, and I thank him for it. You must take me as I am. Does my education disgrace me? I have learned by it the most thorough contempt for what is called religion. My ideas are shocking, I suppose, because I always tell the truth. I have read books that a young girl ought not to read, they say. They have educated me, so I am not a doll, like most young ladies. But I have disdainfully refused the hand of Amable Bricourt--that is my crime. His venerable mother (as he calls her) will never forgive me for having disappointed her admirable son (as she calls him)." Corinne replied roguishly: "Ah! you prefer Paul Frager's company." Odette shrugged her shoulders. "M. Frager is as little to me as the admirable son himself, or any of those who have proposed to me. I shall never marry, as I have already told you a hundred times. Only I believe he is unhappy; for some reason he does not live with his mother, and I know he grieves over it. Besides that, he talks well, is very intelligent and cultivated, and has one great advantage over everybody else--he never has made love to me." "What! he never has made love to you?" "Never, in any way." "He has been completely devoted to you for the past year. Why, knowing you to be here, he has come to pass the Winter at Canet, not a mile away!" Odette burst into a silvery laugh. "Who knows? he may have come solely on your account, dear Corinne." But before her friend could reply, she continued: "To tell the truth, I am bored to death." "Since your trip to Pornic!" Mme. Descoutures said these words with some emphasis, which Odette seemed to understand, as she grew pale. A yellow lightning shot across the depths of her dark eyes. Her lips moved as if she were about to speak, but, evidently changing her mind, she sank again into her revery, her eyes fixed on the sea. "Have I annoyed you?" Corinne asked gently; "then let us leave this subject. Have you heard from Germaine to-day?" The name of Germaine roused Odette again. "No," she replied. "No letter from her for three days. If I do not hear before to-night, I shall telegraph to Naples. I am afraid she is sick." She rose and paced up and down the terrace in great agitation. Her face expressed the deepest anxiety. "Come, come, do not be so distressed! Germaine, perhaps, has been kept busy by her aunt; you know Mme. Rozan's health is very delicate. But see, while we have been chatting, the gentlemen have finished their stroll, and are returning by the beach."