He now began recalling to mind certain details of their stay at Les Fondettes.

One evening, for instance, he had surprised Sabine in the shade of some trees, when she was so much agitated as to be unable to answer his questions.

The man had been present; why should she not be with him now?
The more he thought about it the more possible the whole story became, and he ended by thinking it natural and even inevitable.

While he was in his shirt sleeves in the house of a harlot his wife was undressing in her lover's room.

Nothing could be simpler or more logical! Reasoning in this way, he forced himself to keep cool.