Adolphine raised her lovely eyes, as if appealing to heaven, as she replied:
"No, I have no pain."
"I can't have you sick! I insist upon your recovering your fine, healthy color of the old days; and now that I have returned, I will look after your health."
"Thanks! thanks! you will come to see us often, then?"
"I hope to do so; and your sister—does she come here often?"
"Thursdays, because we receive then; occasionally on other days."
Monsieur Gerbault's arrival put an end to this conversation. He greeted Gustave cordially, and the young man made no secret of the pleasure it would give him to come frequently to the house; he did not mention Fanny, preferring not to begin to talk of his renewed hopes at their very first meeting; but he adroitly found a way to make known his financial position, which would enable him, if he married, to offer an attractive prospect to the woman who should bear his name.
Now that his oldest daughter was a widow, Monsieur Gerbault saw no impropriety in Gustave's meeting her; and he was the first to urge the young man to come to his house at his pleasure, as before. Gustave was enchanted; he pressed Monsieur Gerbault's hand, then Adolphine's, and took his leave without noticing that the latter's depression had become more marked than ever.