"Yes," continued the abbé, looking through his notes, "that's all I see that would do for you just now. Will you talk it over with your son, madame, and consult your husband? I am quite at your service. When I have the pleasure of seeing you here again, will you bring with you just a few figures, a little note that would give me an idea of your intentions with regard to settling your son. And bring your daughter with you. I should be delighted to see the dear child again."
"Would you mind fixing some time when I should not disturb you quite so much as I have done to-day, monsieur?"
"Oh, madame, my time belongs to every one who has need of me, and I am only too much honoured. The thing is that in a fortnight's time—if you came then, I should be in the country, and I only come one day a week to Paris, then. Yes, it's a sheer necessity, and so I have had to make up my mind to it. By the end of the winter I get so worn out; I have so much to attend to, and then these four flights of stairs kill me. But what am I to do? I am obliged to pay in some way for the right of having my chapel, for the precious privilege of being able to have mass in my own home. No one could sleep over a chapel, you see. Ah, an idea has just struck me: why should you not come to see me in the country—at Colombes? It would be a little excursion. I have plenty of fruit, and I take a landowner's pride in my fruit. I could offer you luncheon, a very informal luncheon. Will you come, madame—and your daughter? Would your son give me the pleasure of his company too?"
VII
A quarter of an hour later a footman in a red coat opened the door of a flat on a first floor in the Rue Taitbout in answer to Mme. Mauperin's ring.
"Good-morning, Georges. Is my son in?"
"Yes, madame, monsieur is there."
Mme. Mauperin had smiled on her son's domestic, and as she walked along she smiled on the rooms, on the furniture, and on everything she saw. When she entered the study her son was writing and smoking at the same time.
"Well, I never!" he exclaimed, taking his cigar out of his mouth and leaning his head against the back of his chair for his mother to kiss him. "It's you, is it, mamma?" he went on, continuing to smoke. "You didn't say a word about coming to Paris to-day. What brings you here?"