not pass the night there also.

"And you can reserve three rooms for us?" was the little abbe's final
demand.

This time the face of mine host lost its jovial assurance.

"Three rooms? Ah, no, Monsieur le Cure--that is quite impossible!...
But we can manage all the same.... I have an attic for your chauffeur,
and a fine double-bedded room for you and Monsieur the corporal....
That will suit you--I think?"

"Yes, quite well! Very well, indeed!" declared Fandor, delighted at
this opportunity of keeping his queer travelling companion under his
eye.

The little abbe was far from satisfied.

"What! You have not two rooms for us?" he expostulated. "I have a
horror of sharing a room with anyone whatever! I am not accustomed to
it; and I cannot sleep under those conditions!"

"Monsieur le Cure, it's full up here! I have a wedding party on my
hands!"

"Well, then is there no hotel near by, where I can."...

"No, Monsieur le Cure: I am the only hotel-keeper about here!"

"Is it far to the parsonage?"

"But, my dear Abbe!" protested Fandor: "I beg of you to take the room!
I can sleep anywhere ... on two chairs in the dining-room!"

"Certainly not!" declared the little priest. He turned to the
hotel-keeper: "Tell me just how far the parsonage is from here?"

"At least eight kilometres."

"Oh, then, it is out of the question! What a disagreeable business
this is!... We shall pass a dreadful night!"

The abbe was greatly put out.

"No, no! I will leave the room to you!" again protested Fandor.

"Do not talk so childishly, Corporal! We have to be on the road again
to-morrow. What good purpose will it serve if we allow ourselves to be
over-fatigued and so fit for nothing?... After all, a bad night will not
last forever!... We must manage to put up with the inconvenience."

Fandor nodded acquiescence. Things were going as he wished.

"Dinner at once!" ordered the abbe.

An affable Normandy girl laid their table in a small room: a profusion
of black cocks with scarlet combs decorated the paper on its walls.
The effect was at once bewildering and weirdly funereal.

Meanwhile the abbe walked up and down in the courtyard; to judge by
his expression he was in no pleasant frame of mind.

When he came to table, Fandor noticed that he forgot to pronounce the
Benedicite. He was still more interested when the ecclesiastic
attacked a tasty chicken with great gusto.

"This is certainly the 1st of December, therefore a