owed that.

--Spiritual sister is not exactly the expression, said Marcel, it is
_adoptive sister_, because they were adopted.[1] Alas, Veronica, the clergy
were slightly dissolute in former times: it is no longer so in our days, in
which so many holy ecclesiastics give an example of the rarest virtues.

--Oh, three wives, Monsieur le Cure! three wives! sweet Jesus! they must
have torn out each other's eyes.

--No, Veronica. They agreed very well among themselves. They had different
ideas at that time to what we have now.

--One evening then Monsieur Fortin had drunk at table a little more than
usual. I was going to bring the dessert and I leaned over to take up a dish
which was before him. As the dish was heavy and rather far from my hand, I
supported myself on the back of his chair, and involuntarily I rubbed
against his body with my stomach. "Oh, oh," he said, "if that happens again
I shall pinch that big breast."

--What! Monsieur Fortin used that expression?

--Yes, sir, and many others besides. I blush when I think of it.... Then I
looked at him quite astounded. He began to laugh. I went to look for the
cheese, and I passed again beside him on purpose, and supported myself on
his chair again to place it on the table. "Ah," he cried, "she is beginning
again. _O, mammosa virgo_!"--he repeated it so many times to me that I
remember it--"so much the worse, I keep my promises." And he pinched me.

--Where?

--Where he had said. He made no error. I blushed for shame and drew back as
quickly as possible: "How can he," I said to myself, "use Latin words to
deceive poor women?" Then he cried: "Are you ticklish?"--Yes, sir. "Ah, you
are ticklish. The big Veronica is ticklish! Who would have believed it?"
And he laughed, but I saw clearly that his laugh was put on, and that
something else preoccupied him. And from that moment, each time that I
passed near him and stooped down to clear away, he tried to pinch me where
he could: "And there," he said, "are you ticklish? are you ticklish there?"
I was so stupefied that I could not get over it. "It is a little too much,
Holy Mother of God," I said to myself, "a man like him! to pinch me in this
way! who would believe it! One would not credit it, if one saw it! Ah, I
will see how far he will go, and to-morrow I will give him an account." At
last, when I saw that he would not stop it, and that he was going too far,
I said to him severely: Monsieur le Cure, if you continue to