Nicolas Marais came forward out of the cottage, and then Elise looked up and saw Marie. She smiled and nodded. "I am coming," she called up in her rasping voice; and she did seem in high haste to get to Marie Famette, but Marie saw that she looked beyond her at some one or something else. The girl looked over her shoulder, and there was Léon Roussel, but he did not care to look at her. His eyes were fixed sternly on Nicolas Marais, but Nicolas did not seem to care for his employer's anger: he was smiling rapturously up at Marie, and as she now looked at him he first kissed his hand and then put the note to his lips and kissed it twice.
Marie grew crimson. Elise, who had just reached the top of the steps, laughed, and Léon Roussel stood an instant pale and defiant, and then turned back toward Aubette.
"Stay, stay, Monsieur Léon!" Elise darted after him; then, stopping suddenly, she nodded back at Marie: "Stop and talk to Nicolas, mon enfant: I will make it all right for you with Monsieur Roussel;" and she hurried on in pursuit.
But Marie was too angry with Nicolas to give him even a moment: "How dare he kiss his hand to me? And oh, Léon will think that I wrote that note to him, and how can I ever tell him the truth? Will Elise Lesage tell him?"
She had just a faint hope; and then she reproached herself. Why should not Mademoiselle Lesage tell the truth? She was cross and spiteful, but then, poor thing! she was old and ugly. "And it may be," Marie thought, "that one is not half thankful enough for one's gifts, and that it is very irritating to be plain. It is Alphonse Poiseau who has made me think evil of Elise, and one should not cherish evil thoughts."
Marie went home happier and lighter-hearted: that little glimpse of Léon had quieted the sore longing at her heart, and at first the joy of having seen him made her dwell less on his stern looks and his avoidance of herself.
She came to the broad grassed turning that leads off the main road to St. Gertrude. A saddled donkey was grazing on one side, and on the other an old woman sat on a stone post. She jumped up when she saw Marie. She had looked tall as she sat: she was as broad as she was long now she stood erect in her dark striped gown and black jacket, and white cap with its plain border and lappets pinned together over her forehead.
"Well, well, well!" She spoke in a short bustling voice—a voice that would have been cheering if it had been less restless. "Hast thou then seen Léon Roussel, Marie? Hast thou learned the reason of his absence?"
Marie's tender, sweet look vanished: she tossed her pretty head and pouted: "Léon was not at the market, but I saw him as I came home; only he was not close to me, so we did not speak."
"Didst thou see that vaurien Nicolas?"