In the evening, after one of my dinners at the farm, Madame Kerouët, seated in her great armchair at the chimney-corner, would spin off a distaff of flax, while Marie and I, seated at the same table, arranged the plants we had collected for our herbariums in the course of our winter walks.
When fixing the slight stalks on paper, our hands would often touch. Often when we were both leaning over the table my hair would be pressed against Marie's forehead, or I would feel her warm breath caressing my cheek.
At such times she would blush, her breast would heave rapidly, and sometimes her hand would tremble on the paper.
Then, as if awakening from a dream, she would say to me, pretending to be reproachful: "See, now, how badly you have placed that plant."
"It is your fault," I would answer, laughing. "You neither help me, nor hold the paper."
"Not at all. It is you who have not the least patience, you are always afraid of getting gum on your fingers when you are pasting the little bands."
"Ah, what terrible wranglers!" said Madame Kerouët, "one of you is no better than the other!"
At other times, we took turns at reading aloud some of the works of Walter Scott, in which Madame Kerouët took great interest. Marie had a clear, sweet voice, and one of my greatest pleasures was to listen to her as she read.
But it was a greater pleasure still to watch her. So, when the time came for me to read, if I found any allusion to my love, I would first read the phrases with my eyes, and then repeat them aloud from memory, fixing on Marie a passionate look. Sometimes Marie would lower her eyes, and put on a severe expression, but then, at others, she would blush, and with the end of her pretty forefinger make me an imperious sign to keep my eyes on my book.
Another trick that I invented was this: I would improvise whole passages, and introduce them into the book I was reading, so that when the situation permitted me I could give Marie a more distinct insight as to my love for her.