ir."

He took away the cup and then returned.

"If you knew, Madame," he began, "the happy hours the _Vie Francaise_
helped me to pass when I was away in the desert. It is really the only
paper that is readable out of France, for it is more literary, wittier,
and less monotonous than the others. There is something of everything in
it."

She smiled with amiable indifference, and answered, seriously:

"Monsieur Walter has had a great deal of trouble to create a type of
newspaper supplying the want of the day."

And they began to chat. He had an easy flow of commonplace conversation,
a charm in his voice and look, and an irresistible seductiveness about
his moustache. It curled coquettishly about his lips, reddish brown,
with a paler tint about the ends. They chatted about Paris, its suburbs,
the banks of the Seine, watering places, summer amusements, all the
current topics on which one can prate to infinity without wearying
oneself.

Then as Monsieur Norbert de Varenne approached with a liqueur glass in
his hand, Duroy discreetly withdrew.

Madame de Marelle, who had been speaking with Madame Forestier, summoned
him.

"Well, sir," she said, abruptly, "so you want to try your hand at
journalism?"

He spoke vaguely of his prospects, and there recommenced with her the
conversation he had just had with Madame Walter, but as he was now a
better master of his subject, he showed his superiority in it, repeating
as his own the things he had just heard. And he continually looked his
companion in the eyes, as though to give deep meaning to what he was
saying.

She, in her turn, related anecdotes with the easy flow of spirits of a
woman who knows she is witty, and is always seeking to appear so, and
becoming familiar, she laid her hand from time to time on his arm, and
lowered her voice to make trifling remarks which thus assumed a
character of intimacy. He was inwardly excited by her contact. He would
have liked to have shown his devotion for her on the spot, to have
defended her, shown her what he was worth, and his delay in his replies
to her showed the preoccupation of his mind.

But suddenly, without any reason, Madame de Marelle called, "Laurine!"
and the little girl came.

"Sit down here, child; you will catch cold near the window."

Duroy was seized with a wild longing to kiss the child. It was as though
some part of the kiss would reach the mother.

He asked in a gallant, and at the same time fatherly, to