"I am so unfortunate, monsieur!" "You arouse my profound interest, madame; but we can talk more comfortably elsewhere than on this road. If you will take my arm, madame, we might take a walk about the place until it is time to start." "With pleasure, monsieur." The lady took Auguste's arm, and they walked away from the inn, talking. "If I were not afraid of being too inquisitive, madame, I would ask what makes you leave Paris." "Oh! I am very willing to tell you, monsieur. I am the child of respectable tradespeople; they married me when very young to a man whom I did not love; but I felt bound to obey, in order to gratify my parents." "That was very good of you, madame." "There was a very agreeable gentleman who had courted me before I was married; I didn't love him either, but I listened to him to gratify him." "I understand, madame." "My husband didn't make me happy; he was never willing that I should go out, and I stayed at home because that gratified him. But sometimes I had visitors, among others the gentleman who used to court me." "And that didn't gratify your husband?" "Apparently not, monsieur; for not long ago, happening to find him with me, he turned me out of doors. I undertook to be angry, and he beat me, monsieur; and said he'd do it again whenever he chose." "He is a man who has a most brutal way of procuring himself pleasure." "As I didn't care to be beaten again, I left my husband, and started for Lyon, having barely enough to pay for my passage." "I suppose then, madame, that you have friends in Lyon?" "Oh! it was that gentleman who used to come to see me--he said that he was going there. However, I am no more anxious to go to Lyon than anywhere else. I wanted to get away from my husband, who made me so unhappy." Meanwhile the fellow-travellers had reached a small restaurant. Auguste, remembering that his companion had not dined, proposed that they should go in and regale themselves, and she assented--to gratify him. They entered the restaurant. Auguste asked for a private room, because one does not need witnesses to console a young wife whose husband has beaten her. He ordered as toothsome a repast as the place could afford, because he forgot as usual that he was no longer rich, and readily fell into his former habits. The Avallon restaurateur was put to his mettle to provide a dainty refection for the strangers who had honored his establishment. The dinner was served; Auguste urged the young woman to partake, and she, although she said that she complied only to gratify him, ate everything and did not need to be urged to drink freely of a native wine which the host declared to be of the vintage of the year of the comet.