"That makes one hundred and sixty-eight francs," said the mayor to himself, "that M. Valenod has cost me. I must absolutely speak a few strong words to him about his contract to provide for the foundlings." A minute afterwards Julien found himself opposite M. de Rênal. "I want to speak to M. Chélan on a matter of conscience. I have the honour to inform you that I shall be absent some hours." "Why, my dear Julien," said M. de Rênal smiling with the falsest expression possible, "take the whole day, and to-morrow too if you like, my good friend. Take the gardener's horse to go to Verrières." "He is on the very point," said M. de Rênal to himself, "of giving an answer to Valenod. He has promised me nothing, but I must let this hot-headed young man have time to cool down." Julien quickly went away, and went up into the great forest, through which one can manage to get from Vergy to Verrières. He did not wish to arrive at M. Chélan's at once. Far from wishing to cramp himself in a new pose of hypocrisy he needed to see clear in his own soul, and to give audience to the crowd of sentiments which were agitating him. "I have won a battle," he said to himself, as soon as he saw that he was well in the forest, and far from all human gaze. "So I have won a battle." This expression shed a rosy light on his situation, and restored him to some serenity. "Here I am with a salary of fifty francs a month, M. de Rênal must be precious afraid, but what of?" This meditation about what could have put fear into the heart of that happy, powerful man against whom he had been boiling with rage only an hour back, completed the restoration to serenity of Julien's soul. He was almost able to enjoy for a moment the delightful beauty of the woods amidst which he was walking. Enormous blocks of bare rocks had fallen down long ago in the middle of the forest by the mountain side. Great cedars towered almost as high as these rocks whose shade caused a delicious freshness within three yards of places where the heat of the sun's rays would have made it impossible to rest.