They had now reached the exit, however.
“I shall be in Paris until the end of the week,” said Bonmont. “Let me know how things are going; there is no time to lose, for the candidates are being chosen now. We will speak of the car at another time.”
As they reached the flight of flag-decorated steps, he took Gustave’s hand in his and, holding it, impressed upon him:
“No one must know. The thing is of the utmost moment, my dear Dellion, that no one shall know; not a soul must know that Madame de Gromance is going to Loyer at your request. Now that is understood, is it not?”
“Quite,” replied Gustave, heartily shaking his friend’s hand.
The same evening at eight o’clock young Bonmont went to visit his mother, whom he did not often see, but with whom he was on the friendliest possible terms, and found her finishing her toilet in the dressing-room.
While her maid was arranging her hair she looked away from her reflection in the glass, and turning to her son:
“You don’t look well,” she said.
Ernest’s health had been worrying her for some time. Rara provided her with other more painful worries, but her son was, for all that, a source of anxiety.
“How are you, mother?”