rved a frigid silence. He even dined with them sometimes
on Sundays, at long intervals, and Quenu then made great efforts at
gaiety, but could not succeed in imparting any cheerfulness to the meal.
He ate badly, and ended by feeling altogether put out. One evening,
after one of these icy family gatherings, he said to his wife with tears
in his eyes:

"What can be the matter with me? Is it true that I'm not ill? Don't you
really see anything wrong in my appearance? I feel just as though I'd
got a heavy weight somewhere inside me. And I'm so sad and depressed,
too, without in the least knowing why. What can it be, do you think?"

"Oh, a little attack of indigestion, I dare say," replied Lisa.

"No, no; it's been going on too long for that; I feel quite crushed
down. Yet the business is going on all right; I've no great worries, and
I am leading just the same steady life as ever. But you, too, my dear,
don't look well; you seem melancholy. If there isn't a change for the
better soon, I shall send for the doctor."

Lisa looked at him with a grave expression.

"There's no need of a doctor," she said, "things will soon be all right
again. There's something unhealthy in the atmosphere just now. All the
neighbourhood is unwell." Then, as if yielding to an impulse of anxious
affection, she added: "Don't worry yourself, my dear. I can't have you
falling ill; that would be the crowning blow."

As a rule she sent him back to the kitchen, knowing that the noise of
the choppers, the tuneful simmering of the fat, and the bubbling of the
pans had a cheering effect upon him. In this way, too, she kept him at
a distance from the indiscreet chatter of Mademoiselle Saget, who now
spent whole mornings in the shop. The old maid seemed bent on arousing
Lisa's alarm, and thus driving her to some extreme step. She began by
trying to obtain her confidence.

"What a lot of mischievous folks there are about!" she exclaimed; "folks
who would be much better employed in minding their own business. If you
only knew, my dear Madame Quenu--but no, really, I should never dare to
repeat such things to you."

And, as Madame Quenu replied that she was quite indifferent to gossip,
and that it had no effect upon her, the old maid whispered into her ear
across the counter: "Well, people say, you know, that Monsieur Florent
isn't your cousin at all."

Then she gradually allowed Lisa to see that she knew the whole story; by
way of proving that she had