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It seemed to them as if evening would never come. At ten o'clock they alighted at Bonnieres; and there they took the ferry an old ferry-boat that creaked and grated against its chain for Bennecourt is situated on the opposite bank of the Seine.
"But you do not seem to understand anything, Corporal Vinson!" he cried in an irritated tone. "Whatever I say seems to send you into a state of stupefaction!... I shall never do anything with you, you are hopeless!... Ah, here is Bonniéres! Once outside the town, I will give you some useful explanations."
And at Bonniéres we must be on guard: the police there are merciless: they arrest everyone who exceeds the speed limit.... Nor do we wish to arouse their curiosity about us personally. There is a number of troops stationed here: the colonel is notorious for his strictness: he is correctness personified." Fandor-Vinson stared questionably at the abbé.
It is a pretty village on the banks of the Seine between Mantes and Bonnieres." The cab rolled on. Georges took the young girl's hand and kissed it respectfully. He did not know what to say to her, being unaccustomed to Platonic affection. Suddenly he perceived that she was weeping. He asked in affright: "What ails you, my dear little one?"
At last we got to Bonnieres, a little place of some seven or eight hundred inhabitants, on the limits of Seine-et-Oise; and there we had to alight, for the vehicles, which had brought us from Saint Germain, could proceed no further. Fortunately, we secured others, and went on towards the village of Jeufosse, where the nearest French outposts were established.
As they were approaching Bonniéres, Fandor, whose eyes had been fixed on the interminable route, as though at some turn of the road he might catch sight of their real destination, now felt that the abbé was watching the landscape through half-closed eyes. "You are awake, then, Monsieur l'Abbé?" observed Fandor-Vinson. "I was wondering where we were." "We are coming to Bonniéres." "Good!"
A bridge had been built to connect Bennecourt with Bonnieres: a bridge, good heavens! in the place of the old ferry-boat, grating against its chain the old black boat which, cutting athwart the current, had been so full of interest to the artistic eye.
It was all over; what was the use of raking up the past? However, money having become scarce towards the latter days of July, he was obliged to go to Paris to sell Papa Malgras half a dozen of his old studies, and Christine, on accompanying him to the station, made him solemnly promise that he would go to see Sandoz. In the evening she was there again, at the Bonnieres Station, waiting for him.
He came thither two days in succession, but on the third Christine took him to the market at Bonnieres to buy some hens. The next day was also lost; the canvas had dried; then he grew impatient in trying to work at it again, and finally abandoned it altogether.
Every day, after the second breakfast, came endless strolls, long walks across the tableland planted with apple trees, over the grassy country roads, along the banks of the Seine through the meadows as far as La Roche-Guyon; and there were still more distant explorations, perfect journeys on the opposite side of the river, amid the cornfields of Bonnieres and Jeufosse.
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