"Shut up Julie," said Peter, sotto voce.
But nothing would stop her. "Come now," she said. "What will you give?
You'll give her one for a kiss, won't you, Solomon?"
The girl laughed and blushed "Not before mademoiselle," she said, looking at Peter.
"Oh, I'm off," cried Julie, "I'll spare you one, but only one, remember." and she deliberately got up and left them.
Mademoiselle was "tres jolie," said the girl, collecting her badges. Peter detached a cross and gave it her, and she demurely put up her mouth. He kissed her lightly, and walked leisurely out to settle the bill and call the car. He had entirely forgotten his depression, and the world seemed good to him. He hummed a little song by the water's edge as he waited, and thought over the day. He could never remember having had such a one in his life. Then he recollected that one badge was gone, and he abstracted the other. Without his badges he would not be known as a chaplain.
When Julie appeared, she made no remark, as he had half-expected. They got in, and started off back in the cooling evening. Near Tancarville they stopped the car to have the hood put up, and strolled up into the grounds of the old castle while they waited.
"Extraordinary it must have been to have lived in a place like this," said Peter.
"Rather," said Julie, "and beyond words awful to the women. I cannot imagine what they must have been like, but I think they must have been something like native African women."
"Why?" queried Peter.
"Oh, because a native woman never reads and hardly goes five miles from her village. She is a human animal, who bears children and keeps the house of her master, that's all. That's what these women must have done."