A footman carried the two despatches at the same time to the telegraph-office in the Place de la Bourse, and during the time that, running over the wires along the railroad, they passed the express towards half-past six in the neighborhood of Saint-Rambert, the Derames, Raoul, and Maurice, in the best possible spirits and in most perfect harmony, dined at the same table, and Martha looked at Raoul, and Raoul looked at Martha, and Mme. Derame said to herself: "Martha's falling in love; I know her, she is falling in love. She fell in love just so last year at a ball with a little youth who was very dandified, but without fortune. This time, luckily, yes—Edward told me so—there is plenty of money; so, naturally, if Martha is willing we are."
The train ran on, and on, and on; and Raoul talked, and talked, and talked. He even let slip practical thoughts, raised himself up to general ideas, and developed with force the theory that the first duty of a woman was to be, in all things, refined elegance. He explained, with endless detail, what the life of an absolutely correct fashionable woman was, what it was to be an absolutely fashionable woman. He triumphantly took his fashionable woman from Paris to Trouville, from Trouville to Lake Como, from Lake Como to Monte-Carlo. He drew the trunks of the fashionable woman, marvellous trunks, which were heaped up in the vestibules of first-class hotels. Besides, he had also invented a trunk.
Then, very tactfully, he put Martha through a little examination, which had nothing in common with the examinations of the Sorbonne or the Hôtel de Ville.
"Did she skate?" That's what he wanted to know first! He was himself a very distinguished skater. He needed a sport-loving wife. He had but just pronounced the word skating when suddenly the young brother (how precious little brothers sometimes are) exclaimed: "Ah, it's sister who skates well! She makes figures-of-eight. And who swims well, too—like a fish!"
She skated, she swam, she was sport-loving. Raoul said to the young girl, with deep enthusiasm: "I congratulate you. A woman who can't swim isn't a woman."
And he added, with increasing energy:
"A woman who can't skate isn't a woman."
When he had a strong thought, he willingly used it again in a brief but striking form.
Martha's face beamed with joy. She was really a woman. Never had a sweeter word been said to her.
Night had come; it was necessary, therefore, to tear one's self away from that exquisite conversation, and return to the parlor-car. Young Derame was going to sleep; so they began to prepare for the trip through the train.