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"She was the Gruenebaums' governess?" said Christophe in amazement. "Yes. Pretend you don't know, pretend to be innocent. You'd better!... My father is beside himself. The Gruenebaums are in a rage!... It was not for long: they have sacked the girl." "What!" cried Christophe. "They have dismissed her? Dismissed her because of me?" "Didn't you know?" said Mannheim. "Didn't she tell you?"
"I can't force you to go if it bores you, but I shan't take it back. You can throw it in the fire or even take it virtuously to the Gruenebaums. I don't care. Good-night!" He left Christophe in the middle of the street, ticket in hand, and went away. Christophe was unhappy about it. He said to himself that he ought to take it to the Gruenebaums: but he was not keen about the idea.
The girl has gone away." Christophe was utterly sick at heart and tried to trace the young Frenchwoman. He wanted to write to her to beg her pardon. But nothing was known of her. He applied to the Gruenebaums, but they snubbed him. They did not know themselves where she had gone, and they did not care. The idea of the harm he had done in trying to do good tortured Christophe: he was remorseful.
It was not that the Gruenebaums were really interested in her, only they thought that, as they paid her, she was their property. They were not malicious about it: indiscretion was with them an incurable habit: they were never offended with each other.
Thanks to you!" cried Mannheim. "You are a great man. I am nothing compared with you." "What have I done?" said Christophe. "You are wonderful!" Mannheim replied. "I am jealous of you. To shut the box in the Gruenebaums' faces, and then to ask the French governess instead of them no, that takes the cake! I should never have thought of that!"
And no one cared for her love. Nowhere was her capacity for love less in demand than in her new situation in Germany. The Gruenebaums, whose children she was engaged to teach French, took not the slightest interest in her.
Christophe was in despair. "You mustn't be angry, old man," said Mannheim. "It does not matter. Besides, one had only to expect that the Gruenebaums would find out..." "What?" cried Christophe. "Find out what?" "That she was your mistress, of course!" "But I do not even know her. I don't know who she is." Mannheim smiled, as if to say: "You take me for a fool."
Her presence with Christophe set tongues wagging in the little town: and the malicious rumors came at once to the ears of the Gruenebaums, who, being already inclined to believe anything ill of the young Frenchwoman, and furious with Christophe as a result of certain events which have been narrated elsewhere, dismissed Antoinette without more ado.
Nothing could have been more intolerable to Antoinette than such espionage, such a lack of moral modesty, which made it impossible for her to escape even for an hour a day from their curiosity. The Gruenebaums were hurt by the haughty reserve with which she treated them.
Once or twice it happened that the Gruenebaums, from carelessness, or who knows? from a wicked desire to tease, forgot to give them to her until the evening, and once even until the next morning: and she worked herself into a fever.
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