society, comfortably installed, quietly reposed itself there, glancing through the open bays into the depths of the galleries and the halls, from which a distant murmur ascended above the grating of the pens and the rustling of the newspapers. “What! you here!” said Madame Bourdelais. “I didn't know you.” Near the children was a lady concealed behind the pages of a review. It was Madame Guibal She seemed annoyed at the meeting; but quickly recovering herself, related that she had come to sit down for a moment to escape the crush. And as Madame Bourdelais asked her if she was going to make any purchases, she replied with her languorous air, hiding behind her eyelashes the egoistical greediness of her looks: “Oh! no. On the contrary, I have come to return some goods. Yes, some door-curtains which I don't like. But there is such a crowd that I am waiting to get near the department.” She went on talking, saying how convenient this system of returns was; formerly she never bought anything, but now she sometimes allowed herself to be tempted. In fact, she returned four articles out of five, and was getting known at all the counters for her strange system of buying, and her eternal discontent which made her bring back the articles one by one, after having kept them several days. But, whilst speaking, she did not take her eyes off the doors of the reading-room; and she appeared greatly relieved when Madame Bourdelais rejoined her children, to explain the photographs to them. Almost at the same moment Monsieur de Boves and Paul de Vallagnosc came in. The count, who affected to be showing the young man through the new buildings, exchanged a rapid glance with Madame Guibal; and she then plunged into her review again, as if she had not seen him. “Hullo, Paul!” suddenly exclaimed a voice behind these gentlemen. It was Mouret, on his way round to give a look at the various departments. They shook hands, and he at once asked: “Has Madame de Boves done us the honour of coming?” “Well, no,” replied the husband, “and she very much regrets it. She's not very well. Oh! nothing dangerous!” But suddenly he pretended to catch sight of Madame Guibal, and ran off, going up to her bareheaded, whilst the others merely bowed to her from a distance. She also pretended to be surprised. Paul smiled; he now understood the affair, and he related to Mouret in a low voice how De Boves, whom he had met in the Rue Richelieu, had tried to get away from him, and had finished by dragging him into The Ladies' Paradise, under the pretext that he must show him the new buildings. For the last year the lady had drawn from De Boves all the money and pleasure she could, never writing to him, making appointments with him in public places, churches, museums, and shops, to arrange their affairs.