This time Suzanne was terrified.
Nevertheless she collected all her courage; fully determined to lie to the last extremity.
—Well?
—Well, father? you puzzle me.
And leaning her pretty pale head on her plump arm, she looked at her father with perfect assurance.
She was charming thus. Her black hair, long and curling, partly covered her round, polished shoulders, and her velvety eye was frankly fixed on Durand's.
The old soldier was moved; he looked at his daughter with admiration, and reproached himself doubtlessly for his wrongful suspicions, for he said gently:
—Do not lie to me, Suzanne, and answer my questions frankly. I know very well that you are not guilty, that you cannot be guilty, that you have nothing to reproach yourself with; you quite see then that I am not angry. But sometimes young girls allow themselves to be led into acts of thoughtlessness which they believe to be of no consequence, and which yet have a gravity which they do not foresee. Last night a man entered the garden.
—The garden? said Suzanne, alarmed afresh, and ever feeling the fixed and scrutinizing look dwelling upon her. No doubt, it is a thief. No, father, no, I have heard nothing.
—I have several reasons for believing that it is not a thief; thieves take more precautions; this one walked heavily in my asparagus-bed.