* * * * *

Six months later, when she went to see her parents one Sunday, her
father looked at her curiously, and then said: "Are you not in the
family way?" She remained thunderstruck, and looked at her waist, and
then said: "No, I do not think so."

Then he asked her, for he wanted to know everything: "Just tell me,
didn't you mix your clogs together, one night?" "Yes, I mixed them the
first night, and then every other night." "Well, then you are full, you
great tub!"

On hearing that, she began to sob, and stammered: "How could I know? How
was I to know?" Old Malandain looked at her knowingly, and appeared very
pleased, and then he asked: "What did you not know?" And amid tears she
replied: "How was I to know that children were made in that way?" And
when her mother came back, the man said, without any anger: "There, she
is in the family way, now."

But the woman was furious, her woman's instinct revolted, and she called
her daughter, who was in tears, every name she could think of, "a
trollop" and "a strumpet." Then, however, the old man made her hold her
tongue, and as he took up his cap to go and talk the matter over with
Master Césaire Omont, he remarked: "She is actually more stupid than I
thought she was; she did not even know what he was doing, the fool!"

On the next Sunday, after the sermon, the old _Curé_ published the banns
between Monsieur Onufre-Césaire Omont and Celesté-Adelaide Malandain.