Delbecq had caused the notary to draw up an affidavit in such terms
that, after hearing it read, the Colonel started up and walked out of
the office.

"Turf and thunder! What a fool you must think me! Why, I should make
myself out a swindler!" he exclaimed.

"Indeed, monsieur," said Delbecq, "I should advise you not to sign in
haste. In your place I would get at least thirty thousand francs a
year out of the bargain. Madame would pay them."

After annihilating this scoundrel /emeritus/ by the lightning look of
an honest man insulted, the Colonel rushed off, carried away by a
thousand contrary emotions. He was suspicious, indignant, and calm
again by turns.

Finally he made his way back into the park of Groslay by a gap in a
fence, and slowly walked on to sit down and rest, and meditate at his
ease, in a little room under a gazebo, from which the road to
Saint-Leu could be seen. The path being strewn with the yellowish sand
which is used instead of river-gravel, the Countess, who was sitting in
the upper room of this little summer-house, did not hear the Colonel's
approach, for she was too much preoccupied with the success of her
business to pay the smallest attention to the slight noise made by her
husband. Nor did the old man notice that his wife was in the room over
him.

"Well, Monsieur Delbecq, has he signed?" the Countess asked her
secretary, whom she saw alone on the road beyond the hedge of a haha.