I must ask your help for her; you shall nurse her." Thereupon she faintly blushed, and he no longer doubted the truth of his surmise.

However, Raymonde was just then settling the bill with the easy assurance of a girl who is expert in figures; and immediately afterwards Madame Desagneaux led Madame Volmar away.

The waiters were now growing more distracted and the tables were fast being vacated; for, on hearing a bell ring, everybody had begun to rush towards the door.
Pierre, on his side, was hastening back to his carriage, when he was stopped by an old priest.

"Ah! Monsieur le Cure," he said, "I saw you just before we started, but I was unable to get near enough to shake hands with you." Thereupon he offered his hand to his brother ecclesiastic, who was looking and smiling at him in a kindly way.

The Abbe Judaine was the parish priest of Saligny, a little village in the department of the Oise.
Tall and sturdy, he had a broad pink face, around which clustered a mass of white, curly hair, and it could be divined by his appearance that he was a worthy man whom neither the flesh nor the spirit had ever tormented.