'No, indeed,' she answered with a smile. 'But if I am in the way I can leave at any time, you know. You have quite sufficient trouble with Pauline's illness. I would rather have gone away before, but you insisted upon my staying.'

'You mustn't talk like that,' he interrupted. 'It is only too kind of you to give us the pleasure of your society till poor Pauline can get downstairs again.'

'I can go to Arromanches till my father comes, if I am in the way,' she continued, as though she had not heard him, merely by way of teasing. 'My aunt Léonie has taken a chalet there, and there are plenty of people there, and a good beach where one can bathe at any rate. But she is very wearisome is my aunt Léonie.'

Chanteau laughed at the girl's playful, fondling ways. Though he dare not confess it to his wife, he was entirely on the side of Pauline, who nursed him so kindly and carefully. He buried himself in his newspaper again; while Madame Chanteau, who had been immersed in deep reflections, suddenly started up, as though awaking from a dream.

'There's one thing which I can't forgive her. She has completely taken possession of my son. He scarcely stops at the table for a quarter of an hour, and I can hardly get a single word with him.'

'That will soon be over,' said Louise. 'She must have someone with her.'

Madame Chanteau shook her head and tightened her lips, but the words which she seemed trying to keep back broke out, apparently in spite of herself.

'It's all very well to say that, but it's a little peculiar for a young man to be always shut up with a sick girl. There! I've said what I mean and haven't kept it back, and if it doesn't please others I can't help it.'

Then, noticing Louise's embarrassed look, she added: 'It isn't healthy to breathe the atmosphere of a sick-room. She may easily infect him with her sore throat. Those girls who seem so vigorous have sometimes all sorts of impurities in their blood. Well, I don't know why I shouldn't say it, but I don't think she is quite sound and healthy.'

Louise then feebly defended her friend. She had always found her so nice and kind; that was the only argument which she contrived to bring forward—in reply to the accusation of a stony heart and ill-health. An instinctive desire for tranquil peace and quietness induced her to try to mitigate Madame Chanteau's rough ill-feeling, although every day she listened to her trying to excel her bitterness of the day before. While making some kind of protest against the harshness of Madame Chanteau's language, Louise indeed flushed with secret pleasure at finding herself preferred to Pauline, promoted to the position of favourite. She was like Minouche in this respect, content to be caressing so long as her own enjoyment was not interfered with.