“Good-bye, my kind friend!” said the little fellow, throwing his arms about Auguste’s neck. Mère Fourcy made the young man a curtsy, which lasted as long as it took to count the three thousand francs. Denise glanced at him with an embarrassed air, expecting that he would kiss her; but he did nothing of the sort. After bidding the child adieu, he bowed to the others, sprang lightly to his saddle, and rode away with Bertrand, leaving the girl greatly depressed by the cold manner in which he had left her.
“What does it mean?” she said to herself; “he stayed away because he was afraid he’d fall in love with me, and now he acts as if he didn’t like it because he knows I’m not in love with him. What should I do, so that I can see him often?”
As he trotted along beside his lieutenant, Bertrand, as his custom was, ventured to indulge in a few observations.
“It’s a fine thing to be generous, certainly, and we shouldn’t regret the money we give to do good. Still, monsieur, it seems to me that three thousand francs is a good deal just at this time when our cash-box isn’t very well supplied; you might have embarrassed yourself less by giving it in several instalments, and it would have amounted to the same thing.”
“I probably shall not come to the village again for a long while,” said Auguste pensively.
“Oh! that makes a difference, and I am wrong.”
XII
INVESTMENTS AND INNOCENT GAMES.—THE PUNCH AND THE LAMP-POST
On his return to Paris, Auguste found Monsieur Destival waiting for him at his rooms. The business agent shook hands effusively with his dear friend.
“Dear Dalville, where in the deuce have you been?” said Destival, casting a glance out of the window, into the street, from time to time.
“You have been waiting for me—I am very sorry.”