"Be it so, but if you do not love her well enough, I shall fall in love with her, and I forewarn you that it is much better that I should than any other. Au revoir."
"Au revoir!" Sulpice repeated.
He tried now to force a smile and went down to his cabinet, where he found heaped-up reports awaiting his attention and he turned the pages over nervously and read them in a very bad humor.
She was quite pale as she looked over Sulpice's shoulder and saw him rapidly write several lines on the paper, then she spelled:
"Adolphe Gochard—Go-go-ch-a-r-d."
