the visit he had paid to
old Jeanbernat. La Teuse exchanged scandalised glances with Brother
Archangias. At first she answered nothing, but went round and round the
table, limping frantically and stamping hard enough with her heels to
split the flooring.

'You might have spoken to me of those people these three months past,'
said the priest at last. 'I should have known at any rate what sort of
people I was going to call upon.'

La Teuse stopped short as if her legs had just broken.

'Don't tell falsehoods, Monsieur le Cure,' she stuttered, 'don't tell
them; you will only make your sin still worse. How dare you say I
haven't spoken to you of the Philosopher, that heathen who is the
scandal of the whole neighbourhood? The truth is, you never listen to me
when I talk. It all goes in at one ear and out at the other. Ah, if you
did listen to me, you'd spare yourself a good deal of trouble!'

'I, too, have spoken to you about those abominations,' affirmed the
Brother.

Abbe Mouret lightly shrugged his shoulders. 'Well, I didn't remember
it,' he said. It was only when I found myself at the Paradou that I
fancied I recollected certain tales. Besides, I should have gone to that
unhappy man all the same as I thought him in danger of death.'

Brother Archangias, his mouth full, struck the table violently with his
knife, and roared: 'Jeanbernat is a dog; he ought to die like a dog.'
Then seeing the priest about to protest he cut him short: 'No, no, for
him there is no God, no penitence, no mercy. It would be better to throw
the host to the pigs than carry it to that scoundrel.'

Then he helped himself to more potatoes, and with his elbows on the
table, his chin in his plate, began chewing furiously. La Teuse, her
lips pinched, quite white with anger, contented herself with saying
dryly: 'Let it be, his reverence will have his own way. He has secrets
from us now.'

Silence reigned. For a moment one only heard the working of Brother
Archangias's jaws, and the extraordinary rumbling of his gullet.
Desiree, with her bare arms round the nest in her plate, smiled to the
little ones, talking to them slowly and softly in a chirruping of her
own which they seemed to understand.

'People say what they have done when they have nothing to hide,'
suddenly cried La Teuse.

And then silence reigned again. What exasperated the old servant was the
mystery the priest seemed to make about his visit to the Paradou. She
deemed herself a w