urning with the
love disease and communicating it to others, whose face appears to man
in his restless hours, torments his listless noonday thoughts, haunts
his nights and trespasses upon his dreams.

In the midst of Mademoiselle de Varandeuil's scrutiny, Germinie stooped
over her, and covered her hand with hurried kisses.

"There--there--enough of that," said Mademoiselle. "You would soon wear
out the skin--with your way of kissing. Come, run along, enjoy yourself,
and try not to stay out too late. Don't get all tired out."

Mademoiselle de Varandeuil was left alone. She placed her elbows on her
knees, stared at the fire and stirred the burning wood with the tongs.
Then, as she was accustomed to do when deeply preoccupied, she struck
herself two or three sharp little blows on the neck with the flat of her
hand, and thereby set her black cap all awry.

VI

When she mentioned the subject of marriage to Germinie, Mademoiselle de
Varandeuil touched upon the real cause of her trouble. She placed her
hand upon the seat of her _ennui_. Her maid's uneven temper, her
distaste for life, the languor, the emptiness, the discontent of her
existence, arose from that disease which medical science calls the
_melancholia of virgins_. The torment of her twenty-four years was the
ardent, excited, poignant longing for marriage, for that state which was
too holy and honorable for her, and which seemed impossible of
attainment in face of the confession her womanly probity would insist
upon making of her fall and her unworthiness. Family losses and
misfortunes forcibly diverted her mind from her own troubles.

Her brother-in-law, her sister the concierge's husband, had dreamed the
dream of all Auvergnats: he had undertaken to increase his earnings as
concierge by the profits of a dealer in bric-a-brac. He had begun
modestly with a stall in the street, at the doors of the marts where
executors' sales are held; and there you could see, set out upon blue
paper, plated candlesticks, ivory napkin rings, colored lithographs
with frames of gold lace on a black ground, and three or four odd
volumes of Buffon. His profit on the plated candlesticks intoxicated
him. He hired a dark shop on a passage way, opposite an umbrella
mender's, and began to trade upon the credulity that goes in and out of
the lower rooms in the Auction Exchange. He sold _assiettes a coq_,
pieces of Jean Jacques Rousseau's wooden shoe, and water-colors by
Ballue, s