'It is wrong of you not to distrust Mademoiselle Rouzaire,' he resumed. 'You have no idea, monsieur, of what she is capable. She would betray you a dozen times over in order to obtain good reports from her friend Mauraisin.'
Then, being in a confidential mood, he related how she had repeatedly urged him to listen at keyholes and report to her. He knew her well; she was a terrible woman, harsh and avaricious, despite all her varnish of exaggerated courtesy; and though she was big and bony, with a flat, freckled face, quite destitute of any charm, she ended by seducing everybody. As she herself boasted, she knew how to act. To the anti-clericals who angrily reproached her for taking her girls so often to church, she replied that she was compelled to comply with the desires of the parents under penalty of losing her pupils. To the clericals she gave the most substantial pledges, convinced as she was that they were the stronger party and that on their influence depended the best appointments even in the secular school world. In reality she was guided solely by her own interests, as she understood them, having inherited the instincts of a petty trader from her parents, who had kept a fruiterer's shop at Beaumont. She had not married, because she preferred to live as she listed, and, although she did not carry on with the priests, as was maliciously rumoured by evil tongues, it seemed certain that she had a soft spot in her heart for handsome Mauraisin, who, like the little man he was, admired women built after the fashion of gendarmes. Again, it was not true that she got drunk, though she was very fond of sweet liqueurs. If she occasionally looked very red when afternoon lessons began, it was simply because she ate abundantly and her digestive organs were out of order.
Marc made an indulgent gesture. 'She does not keep her school badly,' said he; 'the only thing that grieves me is the spirit of narrow pietism which she introduces into all her teaching. My boys and her girls are separated by an abyss, not merely by a wall. And when they meet one another, later, and think of marrying, they will belong to different worlds. But is not that the traditional custom? The warfare of the sexes largely arises from it.'
The young man did not mention the chief cause of his rancour against Mademoiselle Rouzaire, the reason which had impelled him to keep aloof from her. This was her abominable conduct in Simon's case. He remembered the quiet effrontery with which she had played the game of the Congregations at the trial at Beaumont, how she had heaped impudent falsehoods on the innocent prisoner, how she had accused him of giving immoral and anti-patriotic lessons to his pupils. And so Marc's intercourse with her since his appointment to Maillebois had never gone beyond the limits of strict politeness, such as the proximity of their homes required. She, however, having seen the young man strengthen his position, in such wise that his sudden downfall could now hardly be anticipated, had made attempts at reconciliation; for, in her anxiety to be always on the stronger side, she was not the woman to turn her back on the victorious. She had manœuvred particularly with the object of ingratiating herself with Geneviève, but the latter in this matter had hitherto shared Marc's opinions and kept her at a distance.
'At all events, monsieur,' Mignot concluded, 'I advise you to keep your eyes open. If I had listened to La Rouzaire I should have betrayed you a score of times. She never ceased questioning me about you, repeating to me that I was a stupid and would never succeed in getting into a decent position.... But you showed me great kindness, and you don't know what horrid things you saved me from; for one soon listens to those creatures when they promise you every kind of success. And, as I am on this subject, I hope you will excuse me if I venture to give you some advice. You ought to warn Madame Froment.'
'Warn her? What do you mean?'
'Yes, yes, I don't keep my eyes in my pockets. For some time past I have seen La Rouzaire prowling around your wife. It is "dear madame" here, a smile or a caress there, all kinds of advances, which would make me tremble if I were in your shoes.'
Marc, who felt greatly astonished, made a pretence of smiling: 'Oh! my wife has nothing to fear, she is warned,' said he. 'It is difficult for her to behave impolitely with a neighbour, particularly when one is connected by similar duties.'
Mignot did not insist, but he shook his head doubtfully, for his intercourse with the Froments had acquainted him with the secret drama which was slowly gathering in their home. However, it seemed as if he were unwilling to say all he knew. And Marc, on his side also, became silent, again mastered by the covert dread, the unacknowledged weakness which assailed and paralysed him whenever the possibility of a struggle between Geneviève and himself presented itself to his mind.
All at once the attack of the Congregations, which he had been anticipating ever since his visit to Salvan, took place. The campaign began with a virulent report from Mauraisin on the subject of the removal of the crucifix, and the scandal caused among the boys' parents by that act of religious intolerance. Savin's protest was duly recorded, and the Doloir and Bongard families were cited among those who blamed the proceeding. The incident was one of exceptional gravity, according to the Inspector, for it had occurred in a clerical-minded town, reputed for its frequent and numerously attended pilgrimages—a town indeed where it was necessary for the secular school to make concessions if it was to escape defeat from its Congregational rival. Mauraisin concluded, therefore, in favour of the removal of the schoolmaster, a sectarian of the worst kind, who had thus incautiously compromised the university cause. And his indictment was completed by the recital of a number of little facts, the harvest of all the daily espionage carried on by Mademoiselle Rouzaire, whose docile little girls, ever at Mass or at the Catechism classes, were contrasted with the idle, rebellious, unbelieving lads trained by that anarchist master, Froment.