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When Madame Fromont appeared, Risler smiled sadly and shook his head. "I thought that you would prefer to come down in his place; but you are not the one with whom I have to deal. It is absolutely necessary that I should see Georges and talk with him. We have paid the notes that fell due this morning; the crisis has passed; but we must come to an understanding about many matters."
And her calm, straightforward glance strove unsuccessfully to meet that of her old friend. With his ignorance of women, and his habit of treating Sidonie as a child, Risler continued in the same tone: "Take her for your model, little one. There are not two people in the world like Madame Chorche. She has her poor father's heart. A true Fromont!"
They have for each other a profound esteem, dating from their first employment at the factory, from that time, long, long ago, when they breakfasted together at the little creamery on the corner, to which Sigismond Planus goes alone now and selects his refreshment for the day from the slate hanging on the wall. But stand aside! The carriage of Fromont Jeune drives through the gateway.
But no one had as yet thought of Fromont jeune. And yet she showed no prudence whatever in her relations with him. On the contrary, she seemed to make a parade of them; it may be that that was what saved them. How many times she accosted him boldly on the steps to agree upon a rendezvous for the evening!
Any sort of humiliation was preferable to that. "Well, it's decided. I will go to-morrow," sighed the poor cashier. And he tossed about in torture, unable to close an eye until morning. Notwithstanding the late hour, Georges Fromont had not yet retired.
Risler left them confronting each other, and went up to Fromont Jeune, whom he was greatly surprised to find there. "What, Chorche, you here? I supposed you were at Savigny." "Yes, to be sure, but I came I thought you stayed at Asnieres Sundays. I wanted to speak to you on a matter of business." Thereupon, entangling himself in his words, he began to talk hurriedly of an important order.
Two or three times she heard some one near her whisper, "That is Madame Fromont Jeune," and, indeed, it was a simple matter for people to make the mistake, seeing the three return together from the station, Sidonie sitting beside Georges on the back seat, laughing and talking with him, and Risler facing them, smiling contentedly with his broad hands spread flat upon his knees, but evidently feeling a little out of place in that fine carriage.
To Risler's mind that phrase explained everything: his partner's constant presence, his choice of guests, and the marvellous gowns worn by Sidonie, who beautified herself in the interests of the firm. This coquetry on his mistress's part drove Fromont Jeune to despair.
While the guests invited for the ball were arriving and mingling with the dinner-guests, while the orchestra was tuning up, while the cavaliers, eyeglass in position, strutted before the impatient, white-gowned damsels, the bridegroom, awed by so great a throng, had taken refuge with his friend Planus Sigismond Planus, cashier of the house of Fromont for thirty years in that little gallery decorated with flowers and hung with a paper representing shrubbery and clambering vines, which forms a sort of background of artificial verdure to Vefour's gilded salons.
Oh! it was a long while ago, a very long while, that their last bill was settled. Fromont Jeune's receipt was dated in September. It was five months ago. The door was hastily closed. Another! Evidently it would be the same thing everywhere. "Ah!
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