daughter, when she said to him one Sunday morning, "My darling papa, I am
going to Mass." He let her go, grumbling; and she noticed Marcel.

The fine figure of the priest struck her; she was touched by the sound of
his voice, and while she fixed her gaze upon him, she encountered his, and
their eyes fell.

In the days when she took her walks at Saint-Denis, and saw for the first
time that she was admired by some handsome young men, she had not
experienced a more delicious emotion.

She was astonished and almost ashamed at it, and nevertheless she returned
for Vespers on purpose to see the Curé. She soon gained the certainty that
she had attracted his attention, and she was flattered at it. What! she, a
little school-girl, was she distracting from his prayers, at the very foot
of the altar, a minister of the altar? She felt herself rise in importance.
But her natural modesty made her reflect directly: "Has he looked at me
because I am a stranger, or because I am pretty?"

She was almost afraid that it was not this latter reason; Marcel's eyes
reassured her.

Nevertheless, the first impulse of self-love satisfied, what did it concern
her? How did this priest's admiration affect her? Is a priest a man? It
must be no more thought of. But she could not prevent herself from thinking
of him, being pleased at his finding her pretty. Others, doubtless, had
found her pretty before he did; perhaps had told her so in a whisper, but
was that the same thing?

The silent admiration of this grave personage, clothed in a sacred