ng
back and that he must forget that night of excitement as a dangerous
dream.

He found Pere Leonard in the doorway of his white house, sitting on a
pretty wooden bench painted spinach green. There were six stone steps
leading to the frontdoor, showing that the house had a cellar. The wall
between the garden and hemp-field was roughcast with lime and pebbles.
It was an attractive place; one might almost have taken it for the abode
of a substantial bourgeois.

Germain's prospective father-in-law came to meet him, and, after five
minutes spent in questioning him concerning his whole family, he added
this phrase, invariably used to question courteously those whom one
meets as to the object of their journey: "So you have come out this way
for a little ride, eh?"

"I came to see you," replied the ploughman, "and to offer you this
little gift of game from my father-in-law, and to say, also from him,
that you would know my purpose in coming."

"Ha! ha!" laughed Pere Leonard, patting his round paunch, "I see, I
hear, I understood!" And he added, with a wink: "You'll not be alone in
paying your respects, my young friend. There are three in the house
already, dancing attendance like you. I don't turn anybody away, and I
should be hard put to it to decide against any one of them, for they're
all good matches. However, on account of Pere Maurice and the quality of
your lands, I should prefer you. But my daughter's of age and mistress
of her own property; so she will do as she pleases. Go in and introduce
yourself; I hope you may draw the lucky number!"

"Pardon, excuse me," replied Germain, greatly surprised to find himself
one of several, where he had expected to be alone. "I didn't know that
your daughter was already provided with suitors, and I didn't come to
dispute for her with others."

"If you thought that because you were slow in coming," retorted Pere
Leonard, with undiminished good-humor, "you would catch my daughter
napping, you made a very great mistake, my boy. Catherine has something
to attract husbands with, and she'll have only too many to choose from.
But go into the house, I tell you, and don't lose courage. She's a woman
worth disputing for."

And, pushing Germain by the shoulders with rough good-humor, "Here,
Catherine," he cried, entering the house, "here's one more!"

This jovial but vulgar manner of being introduced to the widow, in the
presence of her other suitors, put the finishing touch to the