He was a small man, with dark hair very closely cut, with a tonsure that was visible but not more than visible; with a black beard that was shaved every Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday evenings, but which was very black indeed on the Tuesday and Friday mornings.

He always wore the black gown of his office, but would go about his parish with an ordinary soft slouch hat,--thus subjecting his appearance to an absence of ecclesiastical trimness which, perhaps, the most enthusiastic of his friends regretted.

Madame Voss certainly would have wished that he would have had himself shaved at any rate every other day, and that he would have abstained from showing himself in the streets of Granpere without his clerical hat.

But, though she was very intimate with her Cure, and had conferred upon him much material kindness, she had never dared to express her opinion to him upon these matters.
During much of that afternoon M.le Cure sat with Madame Voss, but not a word was said to Marie about her disobedience either by him or by her.

Nevertheless, Marie felt that her sins were being discussed, and that the lecture was coming.