'I should like it very much,' replied Mouret, rising from his seat. 'Let us start at once.'
As he went downstairs he saw no one except Trouche and his wife, who were leaning over the balustrade on the second floor, following each step he took with gleaming eyes. Olympe hurried down behind him and rushed into the kitchen, where Rose, in a state of great emotion, was watching out of the window. When a carriage, which was waiting at the door, had driven off with Mouret, she sprang up the staircase again, four steps at a time, and seizing Trouche by his shoulders, made him dance round the landing in a paroxysm of delight.
'He's packed off!' she cried.
Marthe kept her bed for a week. Her mother came to see her every afternoon and manifested the greatest affection. The Faujases and the Trouches succeeded each other in attendance at her bedside; and even Madame de Condamin called to see her several times. Nothing was said about Mouret, and Rose told her mistress that she thought he had gone to Marseilles. When Marthe, however, was able to come downstairs again, and took her place at table in the dining-room, she began to manifest some astonishment, and inquired uneasily where her husband was.
'Now, my dear lady, don't distress yourself,' said Madame Faujas, 'or you will make yourself ill again. It was absolutely necessary that something should be done, and your friends felt bound to consult together and take steps for your protection.'
'You've no reason to regret him, I'm sure,' cried Rose harshly. 'The whole neighbourhood breathes more freely now that he's no longer here. One was always afraid of him setting the place on fire or rushing out into the street with a knife. I used to hide all the knives in my kitchen and Monsieur Rastoil's cook did the same. And your poor mother nearly died of fright. Everybody who has been here while you have been ill, those ladies and gentlemen, they all said to me as I let them out, "It is a good riddance for Plassans." A place is always on the alert when a man like that is free to go about as he likes.'
Marthe listened to this stream of words with dilated eyes and pale face. She had let her spoon fall from her hand, and she gazed out of the window in front of her as though some dreadful vision rising from behind the fruit-trees in the garden was filling her with terror.
'Les Tulettes! Les Tulettes!' she gasped, as she buried her face in her trembling hands.
She fell backwards and was fainting away, when Abbé Faujas, who had finished his soup, grasped her hands, pressing them tightly, and saying in his softest tone:
'Show yourself strong before this trial which God is sending you. He will afford you consolation if you do not prove rebellious—He will grant you the happiness you deserve.'