et her keep
cows in the fields. She was clad in miserable rags, beaten for the
slightest offence and finally dismissed for a theft of thirty sous
which she did not commit. She took service on another farm where
she tended the poultry; and as she was well thought of by her
master, her fellow-workers soon grew jealous.

One evening in August (she was then eighteen years old), they
persuaded her to accompany them to the fair at Colleville. She was
immediately dazzled by the noise, the lights in the trees, the
brightness of the dresses, the laces and gold crosses, and the
crowd of people all hopping at the same time. She was standing
modestly at a distance, when presently a young man of well-to-do
appearance, who had been leaning on the pole of a wagon and
smoking his pipe, approached her, and asked her for a dance. He
treated her to cider and cake, bought her a silk shawl, and then,
thinking she had guessed his purpose, offered to see her home.
When they came to the end of a field he threw her down brutally.
But she grew frightened and screamed, and he walked off.

One evening, on the road leading to Beaumont, she came upon a
wagon loaded with hay, and when she overtook it, she recognised
Theodore. He greeted her calmly, and asked her to forget what had
happened between them, as it "was all the fault of the drink."

She did not know what to reply and wished to run away.

Presently he began to speak of the harvest and of the notables of
the village; his father had left Colleville and bought the farm of
Les Ecots, so that now they would be neighbors. "Ah!" she
exclaimed. He then added that his parents were looking around for
a wife for him, but that he, himself, was not so anxious and
preferred to wait for a girl who suited him. She hung her head. He
then asked her whether she had ever thought of marrying. She
replied, smilingly, that it was wrong of him to make fun of her.
"Oh! no, I am in earnest," he said, and put his left arm around
her waist while they sauntered along. The air was soft, the stars
were bright, and the huge load of hay oscillated in front of them,
drawn by four horses whose ponderous hoofs raised clouds of dust.
Without a word from their driver they turned to the right. He
kissed her again and she went home. The following week, Theodore
obtained meetings.

They met in yards, behind walls or under isolated trees. She was
not ignorant, as girls of well-to-do families are--for the animals
had instruc