“Would it be an excuse to pass an evening with her and afterwards the night? I don’t know, I am sure, but it is very likely.” I could see at these words, which I hope if Camille Favier ever reads these pages she will forgive, the face of the jealous husband brighten. Evidently the note of excuse sent by Molan at the last minute had not seemed to him genuine. He had found out that Madam de Bonnivet was annoyed at it, and asked himself the reason. Did he think that he had stumbled upon, between his wife and Jacques, one of those momentary quarrels which, more than constant attentions, denounce a love intrigue? He suspected that I was in my comrade’s confidence. He thought I knew the real reason of his absence, and his suspicion was soothed at the sincerity of my voice. As jealous people, being all imagination, mistrust themselves and reassure themselves at the same time, he assumed his most charming manner to say to Baron Deforges, who came in, having delayed a little while in joining us— “Ah, well, Frederick, were you pleased with the dinner?” “I have just called Asmé to congratulate him on the little timbales and to make an observation about the _foie gras_,” the Baron replied. “I shall not tell you what it was, but you shall judge from experience. He is, as I have always said, what I call a real chef. But he is still young.” “He will shape better,” said Bonnivet as he threw me a meaning look, “with a master like you.” “He is the seventh who has passed through my hands,” Deforges said with a shrug of the shoulders and in the most serious tones, “not one more, since I have known what eating really is. The seventh, do you hear? Then I pass them on to you and you spoil them by your praise. Chefs are like other artists. They are not proof against the compliments of the ignorant.” I had reckoned on going for a short time from the smoking-room to the drawing-room and, after a short period of polite and general conversation there, on leaving in the English fashion, taking advantage of the return of the smokers or the arrival of fresh guests to do so. When I reached the drawing-room there were only the two ladies who had dined and Senneterre there. Such small parties being unfavourable to private conversation, I had reason to hope that Madam de Bonnivet would not have the opportunity of cornering and confessing me. I little knew this capricious and authoritative woman who was also well acquainted with her husband’s ways. She had realized that it would not do for her to talk to me in Bonnivet’s presence. Directly I appeared she rose from the couch where she was sitting by Madam Éthorel’s side facing Madam Mosé, with Senneterre on a low chair at her feet holding her fan. She came towards me and led the way into a second drawing-room which opened out of the first, where she sat down upon a couch near me.