'And did he?'
'No, indeed; much to my surprise, he accepted.'
Mouret opened his lips and then closed them again without speaking. The priest winked with an appearance of extreme satisfaction.
'I had to manage the matter very skilfully, you know. For more than an hour I went on explaining your mother-in-law's position to him. He kept shaking his head, however; he could not make up his mind to go, and he was ever dwelling upon his desire for privacy. I had exhausted my stock of arguments when I recalled one point of the instructions which the dear lady gave me. She had told me to tell him that her drawing-room was entirely neutral ground, and that this was a fact well known to the whole town. When I pressed this upon his notice he seemed to waver, and at last he consented to accept the invitation, and even promised to go to-morrow. I shall send a few lines to that excellent Madame Rougon to inform her of my success.'
He lingered for a moment longer, rolling his big blue eyes, and saying—more to himself than to Mouret:
'Monsieur Rastoil will be very much vexed, but it's no fault of mine.'
Then he added: 'Good-morning, dear Monsieur Mouret; remember me very kindly to all your family.'
He entered the church, letting the padded doors close softly behind him. Mouret gazed at the doors and lightly shrugged his shoulders.
'There's a fine old chatterbox!' he muttered; 'one of those men who never give one a chance of getting in a word, but go on chattering away for hours without ever telling one anything worth listening to. So Faujas is going to Félicité's to-morrow! It's really very provoking that I am not on good terms with that fool Rougon!'
All the afternoon he was occupied with business matters, but at night, just as he and his wife were going to bed, he said to Marthe carelessly: