"I was forgetting: I didn't tell you the story of Baptiste, master's valet. Probably no one has liked to tell you." The young woman owned that she indeed knew nothing. "Well, you remember his grand dignified airs, his disdainful glances, you yourself spoke to me about them. It was all so much acting. He didn't care for women, he never came down to the servants' hall when we were there; I can repeat it now, he even pretended that it was disgusting in the drawing-room, on account of all the low-neck dresses. I well believe that he didn't care for women!" And she leant towards Renée's ear, and made her blush, though she herself retained all her honest placidity. "When the new stable boy," she continued, "told everything to master, master preferred to dismiss Baptiste rather than send him to jail. It seems that these disgusting things had been going on for years in the stables. And to think that the big scamp pretended he was fond of horses! It was the grooms that he liked!" The bell interrupted her. She hastily took up the eight or ten packages which she had not wished to part with. She let herself be kissed; and then she went off, without looking round. Renée remained in the station until the engine whistled. And when the train had gone off, she was overcome with despair, she no longer knew what to do; her days seemed to stretch before her as empty as the vast waiting hall where she had been left alone. She again entered her brougham and told the coachman to drive her home. But on the way she changed her mind, she was afraid of her room, of the boredom awaiting her there. She no longer felt the necessary courage to return home and change her dress for her usual drive round the lake. She felt a longing for sunlight, a longing to mingle with the crowd. She ordered the coachman to drive to the Bois.