torm, perched on top
of a shattered mast, with his whole body bend backward and covered with
sea-foam; or,--these were recollections of the engraved geography--he
was being devoured by savages, or captured in a forest by apes, or dying
on some lonely coast. She never mentioned her anxieties, however.

Madame Aubain worried about her daughter.

The sisters thought that Virginia was affectionate but delicate. The
slightest emotion enervated her. She had to give up her piano lessons.
Her mother insisted upon regular letters from the convent. One morning,
when the postman failed to come, she grew impatient and began to pace to
and fro, from her chair to the window. It was really extraordinary! No
news since four days!

In order to console her mistress by her own example, Felicite said:

"Why, Madame, I haven't had any news since six months!--"

"From whom?--"

The servant replied gently:

"Why--from my nephew."

"Oh, yes, your nephew!" And shrugging her shoulders, Madame Aubain
continued to pace the floor as if to say: "I did not think of
it.--Besides, I do not care, a cabin-boy, a pauper!--but my
daughter--what a difference! just think of it!--"

Felicite, although she had been reared roughly, was very indignant. Then
she forgot about it.

It appeared quite natural to her that one should lose one's head about
Virginia.

The two children were of equal importance; they were united in her heart
and their fate was to be the same.

The chemist informed her that Victor's vessel had reached Havana. He had
read the information in a newspaper.

Felicite imagined that Havana was a place where people did nothing
but smoke, and that Victor walked around among negroes in a cloud of
tobacco. Could a person, in case of need, return by land? How far was
it from Pont-l'Eveque? In order to learn these things, she questioned
Monsieur Bourais. He reached for his map and began some explanations
concerning longitudes, and smiled with superiority at Felicite's
bewilderment. At last, he took a pencil and pointed out an imperceptible
black point in the scallops of an oval blotch, adding: "There it is."
She bent over the map; the maze of coloured lines hurt her eyes without
enlightening her; and when Bourais asked her what puzzled her, she
requested him to show her the house Victor lived in. Bourais threw
up his hands, sneezed, and then laughed uproariously; such ignorance
delighted his soul; but Felicite failed to understand the c