to take place in the loft, where she slept on the hay, by gracious
permission of the bishop, whose saucepans she cleaned. Impatiently I
waited for the night. When at last her shadow covered the earth I
climbed, by means of a ladder, to the loft, where the girl expected
me. My first thought was to embrace her, my second to admire the
links which brought me into her arms. For, sir, a young
ecclesiastic--a kitchen wench--a ladder--a bundle of hay. What a
train! What regulation! What a concourse of pre-established
harmonies! What a concatenation of cause and effect! What a proof of
God's existence! I was strangely struck by it, and mightily glad I
am to be able to add this profane demonstration to the reasons
furnished by theology, which are, however, amply sufficient."

"Abbe," said Catherine, "the only weak point in your story is that
the girl had a meagre bosom. A woman without breasts is like a bed
without pillows. But don't you know, d'Anquetil, what we might do?"

"Yes," said he, "play a game of ombre, which is played by three."

"If you will," she said. "But, dear, have the pipes brought in.
Nothing is pleasanter than to smoke a pipe of tobacco when drinking
wine."

A lackey brought the cards and pipes, which we lit. Soon the room
was full of dense smoke, wherein our host and the Abbe Coignard
played gravely at piquet.

Luck followed my dear tutor up to the moment when M. d'Anquetil,
fancying he saw him for the third time score fifty-five when he had
only made forty points, called him a Greek, a villainous trickster,