and had produced a dish for supper of which she was justly proud,--a
little _friture_ of lamb, delicate golden-brown, with crimson beets and
golden carrots, cut in flower-shapes, neatly ranged around. Such a
pretty dish was never seen, she thought; and she had put it on the best
platter, the blue platter with the cow and the strawberries on it; and
when she set it before her husband, her dark eyes were actually shining
with pleasure, and she was thinking that if he were very pleased, but
very, very, she might possibly have courage to call him "Mon ami,"
which she had thought several times of doing. It had such a friendly
sound, "Mon ami!"

But alas! when De Arthenay came to the table he was in one of his dark
moods; and when his eyes fell on the festal dish, he started up, crying
out that the devil was tempting him, and that he and his house should
be lost through the wiles of the flesh; and so caught up the dish and
flung it on the fire, and bade his trembling wife bring him a crust of
dry bread. Poor Marie! she was too frightened to cry, though all her
woman's soul was in arms at the destruction of good food, to say
nothing of the wound to her house-wifely pride. She sat silent, eating
nothing, only making believe, when her husband looked her way, to
crumble a bit of bread. And when that wretched meal was over, Jacques
called her to his side, and took out the great black Bible, and read
three chapters of denunciation from Jeremiah, that made Marie's blood
chill in her veins, and sent her shivering to her bed. The next day he
would eat nothing but Indian meal porridge, and the next; and it was a
week before Marie ventured to try any more experiments in cookery.

Marie had a great dread of the black Bible. She was sure it was a
different Bible from the one which Mere Jeanne used to read at home,
for that was full of lovely things, while this was terrible. Sometimes