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"Whose pretty little footmarks could he have taken such pains to efface while he left his own?" said Monsieur de Grandville. "Pooh! I dare say she was an ugly woman," said the procureur-du-roi. "She has paid dearly for her sin," observed the Abbe de Grancour. "Do you know what this affair shows?" cried Monsieur de Grandville.
"There is not a household in which they are not talked over," said the Abbe de Grancour. "The state in which our good Abbe Pascal was put by his last efforts is the present topic of conversation throughout the town." "When is Tascheron to be executed?" asked the bishop. "To-morrow, which is market-day;" replied Monsieur de Grancour.
"He will shock the populace on the scaffold," said the Abbe Dutheil. "The great scandal and horror his conduct will excite may hide our defeat and powerlessness. In fact, as I have just been saying to Monsieur de Grancour, this very spectacle may drive other sinners into the arms of the Church."
The Abbe de Grancour had neither friends nor enemies; he was therefore likely to live and die a vicar-general. He said he was drawn to visit Madame Graslin by the desire of counselling so religious and benevolent a person; and the bishop approved of his doing so, Monsieur de Grancour's real object being to spend a few evenings with the Abbe Dutheil in Veronique's salon.
Long familiarized with the aspects which commend these gardens to all lovers of the picturesque, the Abbe Dutheil, who had induced the Abbe de Grancour to accompany him, descended from terrace to terrace, paying no attention to the ruddy colors, the orange tones, the violet tints, which the setting sun was casting on the old walls and balustrades of the gardens, on the river beneath them, and, in the distance, on the houses of the town.
The Abbe de Grancour believed in the merit of his colleague, recognized his talents, secretly accepted his doctrines, and condemned them openly; for the little priest was one of those men whom superiority attracts and intimidates, who dislike it and yet cultivate it. "He would embrace me and condemn me," the Abbe Dutheil said of him.
By one of those strange freaks of circumstance which are never accounted for, the other vicar-general, the Abbe de Grancour, a stout little man with a rosy complexion and blue eyes, whose opinions were diametrically opposed to those of the Abbe Dutheil, liked to be in the latter's company, although he never testified this liking enough to put himself out of the good graces of the bishop, to whom he would have sacrificed everything.
"Monsieur," said the Abbe de Grancour, approaching the bishop, "it is all useless; we shall certainly have the distress of seeing that unhappy Tascheron die an unbeliever. He vociferates the most horrible imprecations against religion; he insults that poor Abbe Pascal; he spits upon the crucifix; and means to die denying all, even hell."
"But the question here is how to obtain from the condemned man voluntary information which may enlighten justice." "My mission is to win souls to God," said Monsieur Bonnet. Monsieur de Grancour shrugged his shoulders slightly, but his colleague, the Abbe Dutheil nodded his head in sign of approval.
Troubled by these words, the bishop laid down upon a rustic wooden table the bunch of grapes at which he was picking, and wiped his fingers as he made a sign to the two grand vicars to be seated. "The Abbe Pascal did not take a wise course," he said. "He is actually ill in his bed from the effects of his last scene with the man," said the Abbe de Grancour.
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