Rodin, my dear?"

"Faith! I know nothing about it. The steward tells me in his letter to
show M. Rodin the greatest attention, and to obey him as if he were my
master. It will be for him to explain himself, and for me to execute his
orders, since he comes on the part of the princess."

"By rights he should come from Mademoiselle Adrienne, as the land belongs
to her since the death of the duke her father."

"Yes; but the princess being aunt to the young lady, her steward manages
Mademoiselle Adrienne's affairs--so whether one or the other, it amounts
to the same thing."

"May be M. Rodin means to buy the estate. Though, to be sure, that stout
lady who came from Paris last week on purpose to see the chateau appeared
to have a great wish for it."

At these words the bailiff began to laugh with a sly look.

"What is there to laugh at, Dupont?" asked his wife, a very good
creature, but not famous for intelligence or penetration.

"I laugh," answered Dupont, "to think of the face and figure of that
enormous woman: with such a look, who the devil would call themselves
Madame de la Sainte-Colombe--Mrs. Holy Dove? A pretty saint, and a pretty
dove, truly! She is round as a hogshead, with the voice of a town-crier;
has gray moustachios like an old grenadier, and without her knowing it, I
heard her say to her servant: 'Stir your stumps, my hearty!'--and yet she
calls herself Sainte-Colombe!"

"How hard on her you are, Dupont; a body don't choose one's name. And, if
she has a beard, it is not the lady's fault."

"No--but it is her fault to call herself Sainte-Colombe. Do you imagine
it her true name? Ah, my poor Catherine, you are yet very green in some
things."

"While you, my poor Dupont, are well read in slander! This lady seems
very respectable. The first thing she asked for on arriving was the
chapel of the Castle, of which she had heard speak. She even said that
she would make some embellishments in it; and, when I told her we had no
church in this little place, she appeared quite vexed not to have a
curate in the village."

"Oh, to be sure! that's the first thought of your upstarts--to play the
great lady of the parish, like your titled people."

"Madame de la Sainte-Colombe need not play the great lady, because she is
one."

"She! a great lady? Oh, lor'!"

"Yes--only see how she was dressed, in scarlet gown, and violet gloves
like a bishop's; and, when she took off her bonnet, she had a diamond
band round