It had such a friendly sound, "Mon ami!" But alas! when De Arthenay came to the table he was in one of his dark moods; and when his eyes fell on the festal dish, he started up, crying out that the devil was tempting him, and that he and his house should be lost through the wiles of the flesh; and so caught up the dish and flung it on the fire, and bade his trembling wife bring him a crust of dry bread.

Poor Marie! she was too frightened to cry, though all her woman's soul was in arms at the destruction of good food, to say nothing of the wound to her house-wifely pride.

She sat silent, eating nothing, only making believe, when her husband looked her way, to crumble a bit of bread.

And when that wretched meal was over, Jacques called her to his side, and took out the great black Bible, and read three chapters of denunciation from Jeremiah, that made Marie's blood chill in her veins, and sent her shivering to her bed.

The next day he would eat nothing but Indian meal porridge, and the next; and it was a week before Marie ventured to try any more experiments in cookery.
Marie had a great dread of the black Bible.