She appointed two reception days instead of one. On Thursdays all the mere acquaintances called. But Mondays were reserved to intimate female friends. Men were not admitted. Maxime alone was present at those choice gatherings, which took place in the buttercup drawing-room. One evening she had the astounding idea, of dressing him up as a woman, and of presenting him as one of her cousins. Adeline, Suzanne, the Baroness de Meinhold, and the other friends who were there, rose up and bowed, astonished by the sight of this face which they vaguely recognised. Then when they realized the truth, they laughed a great deal, and absolutely refused to let the young man go and change his clothes. They kept him with them in his skirts, teasing him, and lending themselves to equivocal jokes. When he had seen these ladies off by the main gate he went round the park and returned into the house by way of the conservatory. Renée's dear friends never had the slightest suspicion of the truth. Indeed the lovers could not behave together more familiarly than they had previously done, when they declared themselves to be boon comrades. And if it happened that a servant saw them rather close together behind a door, he expressed no surprise at it, being used to the pleasantries of his mistress, and his master's son. This complete liberty, this impunity emboldened them still more. If they slipped the bolts at night-time, in the daylight they kissed each other in every room of the house. They invented a thousand little games on rainy days. But Renée's great delight was still to pile up a terrible fire, and doze in front of the grate. Her linen was marvellously luxurious that winter. She wore the most costly chemises and wrappers, the cambric and inserted embroidery of which barely covered her with a white cloud. And in the red glow of the fire she looked naked, with rosy lace and skin, the heat penetrating through the thin stuff to her flesh. Maxime, squatting at her feet, kissed her knees, without even feeling the garment which had the same warmth and colour as her lovely form. In the dull cloudy weather a kind of twilight penetrated the bedroom hung with grey silk, whilst Céleste went backwards and forwards behind them, with a quiet step. She had naturally become their accomplice. One morning when they had forgotten themselves in the bed, she found them there, and retained all the coolness of a servant with icy blood. They then ceased restraining themselves, she came in at all hours without the sound of their kisses making her turn her head. They relied upon her to warn them in the case of alarm. They did not purchase her silence. She was a very economical, very honest girl, and was not known to have a single lover.