keeper, had none at all as son-in-law to one of the notables of Soulanges.And yet Pere Socquard had received but few offers for his daughter.At twenty-two Aglae already rivalled in size and weight Madame Vermichel, whose agility seemed phenomenal.Sitting behind a counter increased the adipose tendency which she derived from her father.
"What devil is it that gets into girls?" said Socquard to Rigou.
"Ha!" replied the ex-Benedictine, "of all the devils, that's the one the Church has most to do with."
Just then Bonnebault came out of the billiard-room with a cue in his hand, and struck Marie sharply, saying:--
"You've made me miss my stroke; but I'll not miss you, and I'll give it to you till you muffle that clapper of yours."
Socquard and Rigou, who now thought it wise to interfere, entered the cafe by the front door, raising such a crowd of flies that the light from the windows was obscured; the sound was like that of the distant practising of a drum-corps.After their first excitement was over, the big flies with the bluish bellies, accompanied by the stinging little ones, returned to their quarters in the windows, where on three tiers of planks, the paint of which was indistinguishable under the fly-
specks, were rows of viscous bottles ranged like soldiers.
Marie was crying.To be struck before a rival by the man she loves is one of those humiliations that no woman can endure, no matter what her place on the social ladder may be; and the lower that place is, the more violent is the expression of her wrath.The Tonsard girl took no notice of Rigou or of Socquard; she flung herself on a bench, in gloomy and sullen silence, which the ex-monk carefully watched.
"Get a fresh lemon, Aglae," said Pere Socquard, "and go and rinse that glass yourself."
"You did right to send her away," whispered Rigou, "or she might have been hurt"; and he glanced significantly at the hand with which Marie grasped a stool she had caught up to throw at Aglae's head.
"Now, Marie," said Socquard, standing before her, "people don't come here to fling stools; if you were to break one of my mirrors, the milk of your cows wouldn't pay for the damage."
"Pere Socquard, your daughter is a reptile; I'm worth a dozen of her, I'd have you know.If you don't want Bonnebault for a son-in-law, it is high time for you to tell him to go and play billiards somewhere else; he's losing a hundred sous every minute."
In the middle of this flux of words, screamed rather than said, Socquard took Marie round the waist and flung her out of the door, in spite of her cries and resistance.It was none too soon; for Bonnebault rushed out of the billiard-room, his eyes blazing.
"It sha'n't end so!" cried Marie Tonsard.
"Begone!" shouted Bonnebault, whom Viollet held back round the body lest he should do the girl some hurt."Go to the devil, or I will never speak to you or look at you again!"
"You!" said Marie, flinging him a furious glance."Give me back my money, and I'll leave you to Mademoiselle Socquard if she is rich enough to keep you."
Thereupon Marie, frightened when she saw that even Socquard-Alcides could scarcely hold Bonnebault, who sprang after her like a tiger, took to flight along the road.
Rigou followed, and told her to get into his carriole to escape Bonnebault, whose shouts reached the hotel Soudry; then, after hiding Marie under the leather curtains, he came back to the cafe to drink his lemonade and examine the group it now contained, composed of Plissoud, Amaury, Viollet, and the waiter, who were all trying to pacify Bonnebault.
"Come, hussar, it's your turn to play," said Amaury, a small, fair young man, with a dull eye.
"Besides, she's taken herself off," said Viollet.
If any one ever betrayed astonishment it was Plissoud when he beheld the usurer of Blangy sitting at one of the tables, and more occupied in watching him, Plissoud, than in noticing the quarrel that was going on.In spite of himself, the sheriff allowed his face to show the species of bewilderment which a man feels at an unexpected meeting with a person whom he hates and is plotting against, and he speedily withdrew into the billiard-room.
"Adieu, Pere Socquard," said Rigou.
"I'll get your carriage," said the innkeeper; "take your time."
"How shall I find out what those fellows have been saying over their pool?" Rigou was asking himself, when he happened to see the waiter's face in the mirror beside him.