—'Pon my word, I don't know. I caught a chill after an evening performance, and when I woke up the next morning, I could not move arm or leg. My father was obliged to leave me here in the hospital. They have been very kind to me, and an old gentleman has even paid my coach-fare. Oh, there are good people everywhere.
—And you are going to Nancy?
—To Nancy first, then I shall rejoin the company, which ought to be at
Epinal.
Ridoux was listening in his corner.
—You know this young person then? he said.
—I know her through having seen her once at Althausen.
—Twice, the young girl corrected him: when I arrived and when I went away.
You remember, we were both of us at our window?
Marcel remembered it very well; he remembered still better the fantastic sight in the market-place, and the lascivious dance, and the theatrical low-cut dress of the mountebank, which had awakened all at once the passion of his feelings. But as he was afraid of allowing the young girl to suspect that the memory of her had left too deep a mark upon him, he answered.
—I don't remember.
Meanwhile, a throng of beggars besieged the diligence; allured by the sight of the two cassocks, they recited all at the same time litanies, paters and aves in undefinable accents and in lamentable voices. Ridoux and Marcel with much ostentation distributed a few sous among the most bare-faced and importunate, that is to say among the most expert beggars and consequently those who least deserved attention, then they threw themselves back into the carriage and shut their ears.