"
Such visits as we pay to an aged parent on New Year's Day," said Durtal.
"No, at Easter," corrected Madame Bavoil.
"And among these Fair Penitents," the Abbé Plomb went on, "we have that terrible variety, the wife of the Député who votes on the wrong side, and to his wife's objurgations retorts: 'Why, I am at heart a better Christian than you are!'
"Invariably and every time, she repeats the list of her husband's private virtues, and deplores his conduct as a public man; and this history, which is never ending, always leads up to the praises she awards herself, almost to requiring us to apologize for all the annoyance the Church occasions her."
The Abbé Gévresin smiled, and said,—
"When I was in Paris, attached to one of the parishes on the left bank of the Seine, in which there is a huge draper's and fancy shop, I had to deal with a very curious class of women. Especially on days when there was a great show of cotton and linen goods, or a sale of bankrupt stock, there was a perfect rush of well-dressed women to the confessional. These people lived on the other side of the water; they had come to that part of the town to buy bargains, and finding the departments of the shop too full, no doubt, they meant to wait till the crowd should be thinner, to make their selection in comfort; so then, not knowing what to be doing, they took refuge in the church, and, tortured by the need for speech, they asked for the priest whose turn it was to attend, and to justify themselves, chattered in the confessional as if it had been a drawing-room, merely to kill time."
"Not being able to go to a café like a man, they go to church," said Durtal.
"Unless it is," said Madame Bavoil, "that they would rather confide to an unknown priest the sins it would pain them to confess to their own director."
"At any rate, this is a new light on things: the influence of big shops on the tribunal of penance!" exclaimed Durtal.