‘I thought so,’ was the sententious reply.
Without troubling my head why he ‘thought so,’ I begged that the curé might be informed that a gentleman at the inn begged to speak with him for a few minutes.
‘The Père José, I suppose?’ said the host significantly.
‘With all my heart,’ said I; ‘José or Pierre, it’s all alike to me.’
‘He is there in waiting this half-hour,’ said the host, pointing with his thumb to a small salon off the kitchen.
‘Indeed!’ said I; ‘how very polite the attention! I ‘m really most grateful.’
With which, without delaying another moment, I pushed open the door, and entered.
The Père José was a short, ruddy, astute-looking man of about fifty, dressed in the canonical habit of a Flemish priest, which from time and wear had lost much of its original freshness. He had barely time to unfasten a huge napkin, which he had tied around his neck during his devotion to a great mess of vegetable soup, when I made my bow to him.
‘The Père José, I believe?’ said I, as I took my seat opposite to him.
‘That unworthy priest!’ said he, wiping his lips, and throwing up his eyes with an expression not wholly devotional.