Whether it was his liking for the roundabout that prompted him, or the inspiration of his guiding genius, or whether he wanted to quell a certain unruliness of body and mind, so as to be master of himself when he arrived at his brother’s—for whatever reason, Lafcadio took the longest way round; he had followed the Boulevard des Invalides, passed again by the scene of the fire, and was going down the Rue de Bellechasse.
“Thirty-four Rue de Verneuil,” he was saying to himself as he walked along, “four and three, seven—a lucky number.”
He was turning out of the Rue St. Dominique where it intersects the Boulevard St. Germain, when, on the other side of the road, he thought he saw and recognised the young girl, who, it must be confessed, had occupied his thoughts not a little since the day before. He immediately quickened his pace.... Sure enough, it was she! He caught her up at the end of the short Rue de Villersexel, but, reflecting that it would not be very like a Baraglioul to accost her, he contented himself with smiling, raising his hat a little and bowing discreetly; then, after passing her swiftly, he thought it highly expedient to drop into a tobacconist’s shop, while the young lady, who was again in front, turned down the Rue de l’Université.
When Lafcadio came out of the tobacconist’s and entered the same street in his turn, he looked right and left: the young girl had vanished.—Lafcadio, my friend, you are verging on the commonplace. If you are going to fall in love, do not count on my pen to paint the disturbance of your heart.... But no! the idea of beginning a pursuit was distasteful to him; and besides he did not want to be late for his appointment with Julius, and the roundabout way by which he had come allowed no time for further dawdling. Fortunately the Rue de Verneuil was near at hand, and the house in which Julius lived, at the first corner. Lafcadio tossed the Count’s name to the porter and darted upstairs.
In the meantime, Genevieve de Baraglioul, Count Julius’s elder daughter—for it was she, on her way back from the Hospital for Sick Children, where she went every morning—had been far more agitated than Lafcadio by this second meeting, and hurrying home as quickly as she could, she had entered the front door just as Lafcadio had turned into the street, and was already nearing the second floor, when the sound of rapid steps behind her made her look round; someone was coming upstairs more quickly than she; she stood aside to let the person pass, but when she recognized Lafcadio, who stopped, petrified, in front of her:
“Is it worthy of you,” she said in as angry a tone as she could muster, “to follow me like this?”
“Oh! what can you think of me?” cried Lafcadio. “I’m afraid you’ll not believe me when I say that I didn’t see you coming into this house—that I’m extremely astonished to meet you here. Isn’t this where Count Julius de Baraglioul lives?”
“What?” said Genevieve, blushing; “can you be the new secretary my father is expecting? Monsieur Lafcadio Wlou ... you have such a peculiar name, I don’t know how to pronounce it.” And as Lafcadio, blushing in his turn, bowed, she went on:
“Since I’ve met you, may I ask you as a favour not to speak to my parents about yesterday’s adventure, which I don’t think would be at all to their taste; and particularly not to say anything about my purse, which I told them I had lost.”
“I was going to ask you myself to say nothing about the absurd part you saw me play in the business. I’m like your parents; I don’t at all understand it or approve of it. You must have taken me for a Newfoundland. I couldn’t restrain myself. Forgive me. I have much to learn.... But I shall learn in time, I promise you.... Will you give me your hand?”