he
bull's-eye when he remarked, 'It is less important to know whether the
modern pharmaceutic sacrileges are potent, than to study the motives of
the Satanists and fallen priests who prepare them.'

"Ah, if there were some way of getting acquainted with Canon Docre, of
insinuating oneself into his confidence, perhaps one would attain clear
insight into these questions. I learned long ago that there are no
people interesting to know except saints, scoundrels, and cranks. They
are the only persons whose conversation amounts to anything. Persons of
good sense are necessarily dull, because they revolve over and over
again the tedious topics of everyday life. They are the crowd, more or
less intelligent, but they are the crowd, and they give me a pain. Yes,
but who will put me in touch with this monstrous priest?" and, as he
poked the fire, Durtal said to himself, "Chantelouve, if he would, but
he won't. There remains his wife, who used to be well acquainted with
Docre. I must interrogate her and find out whether she still corresponds
with him and sees him."

The entrance of Mme. Chantelouve into his reflections saddened him. He
took out his watch and murmured, "What a bore. She will come again, and
again I shall have to--if only there were any possibility of convincing
her of the futility of the carnal somersaults! In any case, she can't be
very well pleased, because, to her frantic letter soliciting a meeting,
I responded three days later by a brief, dry note, inviting her to come
here this evening. It certainly was lacking in lyricism, too much so,
perhaps."

He rose and went into his bedroom to make sure that the fire was burning
brightly, then he returned and sat down, without even arranging his room
as he had the other times. Now that he no longer cared for this woman,
gallantry and self-consciousness had fled. He awaited her without
impatience, his slippers on his feet.

"To tell the truth, I have had nothing pleasant from Hyacinthe except
that kiss we exchanged when her husband was only a few feet away. I
certainly shall not again find her lips a-flame and fragrant. Here her
kiss is insipid."

Mme. Chantelouve rang earlier than usual.

"Well," she said, sitting down. "You wrote me a nice letter."

"How's that?"

"Confess frankly that you are through with me."

He denied this, but she shook her head.

"Well," he said, "what have you to reproach me with? Having written you
only a short note? But there was