In the end Sylvia found her rather dull, and preferred to go tearing about the country with Blanche, who, though she had been a scullery-maid in a Boulogne hotel only a year ago, had managed during her short career on the stage to collect more lovers than Madame Perron had collected dolls. She had a passion for driving. Sylvia could always be sure that on the morning after their opening performance in any town a wagonette or dog-cart would be waiting to take them to some neighboring village, where a jolly party would make a tremendous noise, scandalize the inhabitants, and depart, leaving a legacy of unpopularity in the district for whichever of Blanche's lovers had paid for the entertainment with his purse and his reputation. Once they arrived at a village where a charity bazaar was being held under the direction of the _curé_. Blanche was presented to him as a distinguished actress from Paris who was seeking peace and recreation in the depths of the country. The _curé_ asked if it would be presuming too far on her good nature to give them a taste of her art in the cause of holy charity, a speech perhaps from Corneill or Racine. Blanche assented immediately and recited a piece stuffed so full of spicy argot that the rustic gentility understood very little of it, though enough to make them blush--all except the priest, that is, who was very deaf and asked Blanche, when she had finished, if it were not a speech from Phèdre she had declaimed, thanking her very earnestly for the pleasure she had given his simple parish folk, a pleasure, alas, which he regretted he had not been able to enjoy as much as he should have enjoyed it before he became deaf. On another occasion they drove to see the ruins of an ancient castle in Brittany, and afterward went down into the village to drink wine in the garden of the inn, where an English family was sitting at afternoon tea. Sylvia stared curiously at the two little girls who obeyed their governess so promptly and ate their cakes so mincingly. They were the first English girls she had ever seen, and she would very much have liked to tell them that her father was English, for they seemed to want cheering up, so solemn were their light-blue eyes and so high their boots. Sylvia whispered to Blanche that they were English, who replied that so much was very obvious, and urged Sylvia to address them in their native tongue; it would give them much pleasure, she thought. Sylvia, however, was too shy, so Blanche in her loudest voice suddenly shouted: "Oh yes! T'ank you! I love you! All right! You sleep with me? Goddambleudi!"