"'This man,' said Madame Cornouiller, 'could just as well work in your garden Monday or Tuesday. Moreover, that will be much better. One should not work on Sunday.' "'He works all the week.' "I have often noticed that the most absurd and ridiculous reasons are the least disputed: they disconcert the adversary. Madame Cornouiller insisted, less than one might expect of a person so little disposed to give up. Rising from her armchair, she asked: "'What do you call your gardener, dearest?' "'Putois,' answered my mother without hesitation. "Putois was named. From that time he existed. Madame Cornouiller took herself off, murmuring: 'Putois! It seems to me that I know that name. Putois! Putois! I must know him. But I do not recollect him. Where does he live?' "'He works by the day. When one wants him one leaves word with this one or that one.' "'Ah! I thought so, a loafer and a vagabond--a good-for-nothing. Don't trust him, dearest.' "From that time Putois had a character." II Messieurs Goubin and Jean Marteau having arrived, Monsieur Bergeret put them in touch with the conversation. "We were speaking of him whom my mother caused to be born gardener at Saint-Omer and whom she christened. He existed from that time on." "Dear master, will you kindly repeat that?" said Monsieur Goubin, wiping the glass of his monocle. "Willingly," replied Monsieur Bergeret. "There was no gardener. The gardener did not exist. My mother said: 'I am waiting for the gardener.' At once the gardener was. He lived." "Dear master," said Monsieur Goubin, "how could he live since he did not exist?" "He had a sort of existence," replied Monsieur Bergeret. "You mean an imaginary existence," Monsieur Goubin replied, disdainfully.