He did not speak falsely in promising it; for to a Christian the word of a priest is sacred, and he only intended to let the curé read the contract under the seal of confession.
The next day it so happened that M. Perdreau went to the city, where he expected to pass two days, to plan an affair still worse than the rest, which you will know in due time. Ragaud, thus having the field clear, hurried off to Val-Saint, with the papers carefully folded under his blouse.
That morning Jeannette was not in good humor. Three weeks had gone by without any news of Jeannet, who did not even return to sleep at Muiceron. She received her loving Isidore like a spoiled child, shrugged her shoulders when he told her she was charmingly pretty, and ended by telling him he must find out something about Jean-Louis, and bring him back to her as quickly as possible, or else she would not believe he loved her.
Isidore, who had every defect—above all, the silly vanity to think that he was fully capable of turning the heads of all the girls, which is, in itself, a proof of presumptuous folly—pretended at first to take it as a joke, imagining that Jeannette wished to provoke his jealousy. But seeing her serious and resolute, he replied in an angry tone that such a commission was not to his taste.
"In that case," she replied, "it is not to mine to talk to you to-day."
"Then I will take my leave," said he, touching his hat.
She did not detain him, and contented herself with smiling, which he thought another little coquettish trick.
"You are like all women," said he slowly, "who do not mind sacrificing their hearts for a whim."
"What do you call a whim?" replied Jeannette. "Is the desire to see my brother again a whim? Very well, then, I declare to you that I will regard nothing decided as to our marriage until Jean-Louis has returned home."
"Do you think, my little beauty," said he, turning red with anger, "that I will let you call that vagabond of a foundling brother after you become my wife?"