She would be lying on a couch, dressed in her soiled wrapper and old bedroom slippers, occupied with nothing but boredom, while Andrew devoted himself to the unguided pursuit of knowledge, the precious pleasure of his life. He would put the book face downwards on his knee and pucker his brows.
"Mon Dieu, ma chérie, what do you want me to say?"
"That you love me."
"I've just said it."
"Say it again."
"Je l'aime bien. Voilà!"
"And that's all?"
"Of course it's all. What remains to be said?"
The honest fellow was mystified. He could not keep on repeating the formula for the two or three hours of their repose. It would be the monotonous reiteration of the idiot. And he could no more have knelt by her side and poured out his adoration in the terms, let us say, of Chastelard, than he could have lectured her on Hittite inscriptions. What did she want? She sighed. He cared for his old book much more than for her.
"My dear," said he, "if you would only read a bit you would find it a great comfort and delight."