You see, at this rather critical period, each had their grievance--Elodie only, of course, as far as their private lives were concerned. Elodie, somewhat romantically inclined, wanted she knew not what. Perhaps a recrudescence of the fine frenzy of the early days of her marriage with Raoul. Sober Andrew craved some kind of intellectual companionship. If Elodie grudged him the joy of books and he yielded to her resentment, he was a lost mountebank. And the very devil of it was that, just at this time, he had discovered the most fascinating branch of literature imaginable. Creasy's Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World, picked up in a cheap edition, had put him on the track. He procured Kinglake's Crimea. He was now deep in the study of Napier's Peninsular War. He studied it, pencil in hand and notebook by his side, filled with diagrams and contours of country and little parallelograms all askew denoting Army Corps or divisions. Of course, he did not expect Elodie to interest herself in military history, but he deplored her unconcealed hatred of his devotion to a darling pursuit. Why could not she find pleasure in some intelligent occupation? To spend one's leisure in untidy sloth did not consort with the dignity of a human being. Why didn't she do this or that? She rejected all suggestions. Retorted: Why couldn't he spend a few hours in relaxation like everybody else? If only he would go and play billiards at the café. That he should amuse himself outside among men was only natural. Sitting at home, in her company, over a book, got on her nerves.
Horatio Bakkus encouraged her maliciously. In Paris he made the flat in the Faubourg Saint-Denis his habitual resting-place, and ate his meals in their company at the café round the corner.
"If there is one thing, my dear Elodie, more futile than fighting battles, it is reading about them," he declared at one of their symposia.
"Voilà! You hear what Horace says! An educated man who knows what he is talking about."
"It's a kind of disease, like chess or the study of the Railway Guide. And when he prefers it to the conversation of a beautiful and talented woman, it's worse than a disease, it's a crime. My dear fellow," he cried with an ironical gleam in his dark eyes, "you're blind to the treasure the gods have given you. Any ass can write a text-book, but the art of conversation is a gift bestowed by Heaven upon the very few."
Elodie, preening herself, asked:
"Is it true that I have that gift?"
"You have the flow of words. You have wit. You talk like a running brook. You talk like no book that ever was written. I would sooner, my dear, listen to the ripple of your speech than read all the manuals of military science the world has produced."
Andrew saw her flattered to fluttering point.
"Don't you know that he is the greatest blagueur an existence?" he asked.