Mrs. Thompson.  “Indeed, I cannot bring myself to imagine that you are in earnest.”

“Ah, madame, do not be so cruel!  How can I have lived with you so long, sat beside you for so many days, without having received your image into my heart?  I am in earnest!  Alas!  I fear too much in earnest!”  And then he looked at her with all his eyes, and sighed with all his strength.

Mrs. Thompson’s prudence told her that it would be well to settle the matter, in one way or the other, as soon as possible.  Long periods of love-making were fit for younger people than herself and her future possible husband.  Her object would be to make him comfortable if she could, and that he should do the same for her, if that also were possible.  As for lookings and sighings and pressings of the hand, she had gone through all that some twenty years since in India, when Thompson had been young, and she was still in her teens.

“But, M. Lacordaire, there are so many things to be considered.  There!  I hear the children coming!  Let us walk this way for a minute.”  And they turned behind a wall which placed them out of sight, and walked on a few paces till they reached a parapet, which stood on the uttermost edge of the high rock.  Leaning upon this they continued their conversation.

“There are so many things to be considered,” said Mrs. Thompson again.

“Yes, of course,” said M. Lacordaire.  “But my one great consideration is this;—that I love madame to distraction.”

“I am very much flattered; of course, any lady would so feel.  But, M. Lacordaire—”

“Madame, I am all attention.  But, if you would deign to make me happy, say that one word, ‘I love you!’”  M. Lacordaire, as he uttered these words, did not look, as the saying is, at his best.  But Mrs. Thompson forgave him.  She knew that elderly gentlemen under such circumstances do not look at their best.

“But if I consented to—to—to such an arrangement, I could only do so on seeing that it would be beneficial—or, at any rate, not injurious—to my children; and that it would offer to ourselves a fair promise of future happiness.”

“Ah, madame; it would be the dearest wish of my heart to be a second father to those two young ladies; except, indeed—” and then M. Lacordaire stopped the flow of his speech.

“In such matters it is so much the best to be explicit at once,” said Mrs. Thompson.

“Oh, yes; certainly!  Nothing can be more wise than madame.”

“And the happiness of a household depends so much on money.”

“Madame!”

“Let me say a word or two, Monsieur Lacordaire.  I have enough for myself and my children; and, should I every marry again, I should not, I hope, be felt as a burden by my husband; but it would, of course, be my duty to know what were his circumstances before I accepted him.  Of yourself, personally, I have seen nothing that I do not like.”

“Oh, madame!”

“But as yet I know nothing of your circumstances.”

M. Lacordaire, perhaps, did feel that Mrs. Thompson’s prudence was of a strong, masculine description; but he hardly liked her the less on this account.  To give him his due he was not desirous of marrying her solely for her money’s sake.  He also wished for a comfortable home, and proposed to give as much as he got; only he had been anxious to wrap up the solid cake of this business in a casing of sugar of romance.  Mrs. Thompson would not have the sugar but the cake might not be the worse on that account.

“No, madame, not as yet; but they shall all be made open and at your disposal,” said M. Lacordaire; and Mrs. Thompson bowed approvingly.

“I am in business,” continued M. Lacordaire; “and my business gives me eight thousand francs a year.”

“Four times eight are thirty-two,” said Mrs. Thompson to herself; putting the francs into pounds sterling, in the manner that she had always found to be the readiest.  Well, so far the statement was satisfactory.  An income of three hundred and twenty pounds a year from business, joined to her own, might do very well.  She did not in the least suspect M. Lacordaire of being false, and so far the matter sounded well.

“And what is the business?” she asked, in a tone of voice intended to be indifferent, but which nevertheless showed that she listened anxiously for an answer to her question.

They were both standing with their arms upon the wall, looking down upon the town of Le Puy; but they had so stood that each could see the other’s countenance as they talked.  Mrs. Thompson could now perceive that M. Lacordaire became red in the face, as he paused before answering her.  She was near to him, and seeing his emotion gently touched his arm with her hand.  This she did to reassure him, for she saw that he was ashamed of having to declare that he was a tradesman.  As for herself, she had made up her mind to bear with this, if she found, as she felt sure she would find, that the trade was one which would not degrade either him or her.  Hitherto, indeed,—in her early days,—she had looked down on trade; but of what benefit had her grand ideas been to her when she had returned to England?  She had tried her hand at English genteel society, and no one had seemed to care for her.  Therefore, she touched his arm lightly with her fingers that she might encourage him.

He paused for a moment, as I have said, and became red; and then feeling that he had shown some symptoms of shame—and feeling also, probably, that it was unmanly in him to do so, he shook himself slightly, raised his head up somewhat more proudly than was his wont, looked her full in the face with more strength of character than she had yet seen him assume; and then, declared his business.

“Madame,” he said, in a very audible, but not in a loud voice, “madame—je suis tailleur.”  And having so spoken, he turned slightly from her and looked down over the valley towards Le Puy.

There was nothing more said upon the subject as they drove down from the rock of Polignac back to the town.  Immediately on receiving the announcement, Mrs. Thompson found that she had no answer to make.  She withdrew her hand—and felt at once that she had received a blow.  It was not that she was angry with M. Lacordaire for being a tailor; nor was she angry with him in that, being a tailor, he had so addressed her.  But she was surprised, disappointed, and altogether put beyond her ease.  She had, at any rate, not expected this.  She had dreamed of his being a banker; thought that, perhaps, he might have been a wine merchant; but her idea had never gone below a jeweller or watchmaker.  When those words broke upon her ear, “Madame, je suis tailleur,” she had felt herself to be speechless.

But the words had not been a minute spoken when Lilian and Mimmy ran up to their mother.  “Oh, mamma,” said Lilian, “we thought you were lost; we have searched for you all over the château.”

“We have been sitting very quietly here, my dear, looking at the view,” said Mrs. Thompson.

“But, mamma, I do wish you’d see the mouth of the oracle.  It is so large, and so round, and so ugly.  I put my arm into it all the way,” said Mimmy.

But at the present moment her mamma felt no interest in the mouth of the oracle; and so they all walked down together to the carriage.  And, though the way was steep, Mrs. Thompson managed to pick her steps without the assistance of an arm; nor did M. Lacordaire presume to offer it.

The drive back to town was very silent.  Mrs. Thompson did make one or two attempts at conversation, but they were not effectual.  M. Lacordaire could not speak at his ease till this matter was settled, and he already had begun to perceive that his business was against him.  Why is it that the trade of a tailor should be less honourable than that of a haberdasher, or even a grocer?

They sat next each other at dinner, as usual; and here, as all eyes