She carried at the end of a string fastened to the belt of her casaquin, a boatswain's whistle, with which she was wont to summon Mariotte by one, and Gasselin by two notes. Gasselin's greatest happiness was to cultivate the garden and produce fine fruits and vegetables. He had so little work to do that without this occupation he would certainly have felt lost.
"Open your eyes," he said, "and forgive me; we will die together." "Die?" she said, opening her eyes and unclosing her pallid lips. Calyste welcomed that word with a kiss, and felt the marquise tremble under it convulsively, with passionate joy. At that instant Gasselin's hob-nailed shoes sounded on the rock above them.
It is difficult to understand why Gasselin and Mariotte had never married; possibly it might have seemed immoral, they were so like brother and sister. Mariotte's wages were ninety francs a year; Gasselin's, three hundred. But thousands of francs offered to them elsewhere would not have induced either to leave the Guenic household.
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