She turned pale in very fear. What was he going to say? Was the post- office to be taken from them? She came straight to the point.
"What have I done wrong, Monsieur? I've never kept the mail-stage waiting; I've never left the mailbag unlocked; I've never been late in opening the wicket; I've never been careless, and no one's ever complained of a lost letter."
The Seigneur saw her agitation, and was sorry for her. He came to the point as she had done:
"We will have you made postmistress—you alone, Rosalie Evanturel. I've made up my mind to that. But you'll promise not to get married—eh? Anyhow, there's no one in the parish for you to marry. You're too well- born and you've been too well educated for a habitant's wife—and the Cure or I can't marry you."
He was not taken back to see her flush deeply, and it pleased him to see this much life rising to his own touch, this much revelation to give his mind a new interest. He had come to that age when the mind is surprised to find that the things that once charmed charm less, and the things once hated are less acutely repulsive. He saw her embarrassment. He did not know that this was the first time that she had ever thought of marriage since it ceased to be a dream of girlhood, and, by reason of thinking much on a man, had become a possibility, which, however, she had never confessed to herself. Here she was faced by it now in the broad open day: a plain, hard statement, unrelieved by aught save the humour of the shrewd eyes bent upon her.
She did not answer him at once. "Do you promise not to marry so useless a thing as man, and to remain true to the government?" he continued.
"If I wished to marry a man, I should not let the government stand in my way," she said, in brave confusion.
"But do you wish to marry any man?" he asked abruptly, even petulantly.
"I have not asked myself that question, Monsieur, and—should you ask it, unless—" she said, and paused with as pretty and whimsical a glance of merriment as could well be.
He burst out laughing at the swift turn she had given her reply, and at the double suggestion. Then he suddenly changed. A curious expression filled his eyes. A smile, almost beautiful, came to his lips.