for his treatment.

However, seeking another outlet for his spite and rancor, he at last
turned to Mathieu, and spoke of Chantebled, saying bitterly that the game
in the covers there was fast becoming scarcer and scarcer, in such wise
that he now had difficulty in selling his shooting shares, so that his
income from the property was dwindling every year. He made no secret of
the fact that he would much like to sell the estate, but where could he
possibly find a purchaser for those unproductive woods, those sterile
plains, those marshes and those tracts of gravel?

Mathieu listened to all this attentively, for during his long walks in
the summer he had begun to take an interest in the estate. "Are you
really of opinion that it cannot be cultivated?" he asked. "It's pitiful
to see all that land lying waste and idle."

"Cultivate it!" cried Seguin. "Ah! I should like to see such a miracle!
The only crops that one will ever raise on it are stones and frogs."

They had by this time eaten their dessert, and before rising from table
Marianne was telling Valentine that she would much like to see and kiss
her children, who had not been allowed to lunch with their elders on
account of their supposed unruly ways, when a couple of visitors arrived
in turn, and everything else was forgotten. One was Santerre the
novelist, who of late had seldom called on the Seguins, and the other,
much to Mathieu's dislike, proved to be Beauchene's sister, Seraphine,
the Baroness de Lowicz. She looked at the young man in a bold, provoking,
significant manner, and then, like Santerre, cast a sly glance of mocking
contempt at Marianne and Valentine. She and the novelist between them
soon turned the conversation on to subjects that appealed to their