COURTHEZON. Good-bye, M. Antonin. Thank you again. [Antonin goes out].
CAROLINE. I shall not keep you a moment. The parcel is just ready.
COURTHEZON. There is no hurry, mademoiselle. I can take the next train. It’s of no importance. Indeed I prefer it. It carries third-class passengers. The fact is I didn’t want to go back to the others. M. and Madame. Mairaut, M. Lignol, all those people frighten me. Besides, I’m so happy just now I can think of nothing else.
CAROLINE. M. Antonin is going to do something about your invention?
COURTHEZON. Yes. I have begun negotiations with a business house at Bordeaux. M. Antonin knows the heads of the firm, and he has been kind enough to say he will write to them about me. But M. Smith goes away to-morrow. That was why I was so anxious the letter should go tonight.
CAROLINE [giving him the parcel which she has just finished] It’s very kind of you to take charge of this. I have put the china in it and the drawings they asked for. You will make my apologies to the firm, won’t you? I have not been very well.
COURTHEZON. Not well?
CAROLINE. Nothing serious. But the doctor said a little country air would be good for me, so Julie and her husband asked me here. They have been very kind. I have been with them a week, and I’m feeling ever so much better.
COURTHEZON. They would hardly have left you in your lodgings with no one to look after you. [Pause]. What a strange idea it was of yours to go off and live by yourself like that!