“Merci! Dans cinq minutes je descendrai.”
“Ne vous pressez pas, et déguisez-vous bien,” he said, and, leaving the room, went half-way down the ladder. Then he turned and put his head into the room again, resting his elbows on the floor.
“Dîtes donc, mon bon monsieur,” he said, evidently at some pains to check his mirth; “avec qui croyez-vous que votre femme vous trompe?”
“Je ne sais pas au juste. Avec un de mes amis, je crois.”
“Le misérable!” he cried, theatrically. “Un Français, sans doute?”
“Oui, malheureusement.”
“Oh, la, la! Mais les amis sont comme ça. C’est très dur, tout de même. Courage! Je vais préparer le café. Au revoir.”
With so sympathetic a garde champêtre I felt I was in luck, and might as well seize the opportunity for assuming my complete disguise, instead of taking to the woods; so I put on my wig and, with some spirit-gum, stuck on my gray whiskers, lined my face lightly, and, in five minutes, presented myself to the more than ever astonished garde champêtre as a respectable, well preserved, elderly gentleman of sixty.
“Mais nom d’un chien!” he cried; “c’est parfait! Elle ne vous reconnaîtra pas; jamais de la vie!”
We sat down and drank the coffee, the best friends in the world; and then, giving him a louis and the box of make-up and razors as a souvenir, I left him with a warm shake of the hand, and went off through the wood to strike the Mentone road back into Monte Carlo.