"Oh, there are very few of the nobility in the district," just as he
might have said, "there are very few rabbits on the hills," and he
began to particularize: There was the Marquis de Coutelier, a sort of
leader of Norman aristocracy, Vicomte and Vicomtesse de Briseville,
people of excellent stock, but living to themselves, and the Comte de
Fourville, a kind of ogre, who was said to have made his wife die of
sorrow, and who lived as a huntsman in his chateau of La Vrillette,
built on a pond. There were a few parvenus among them who had bought
properties here and there, but the vicomte did not know them.

As he left, his last glance was for Jeanne, as if it were a special
tender and cordial farewell. The baroness was delighted with him, and
the baron said: "Yes, indeed, he is a gentleman." And he was invited
to dinner the following week, and from that time came regularly.

He generally arrived about four o'clock in the afternoon, went to join
the baroness in "her avenue," and offered her his arm while she took
her "exercise," as she called her daily walks. When Jeanne was at home
she would walk on the other side of her mother, supporting her, and
all three would walk slowly back and forth from one end of the avenue
to the other. He seldom addressed Jeanne directly, but his eye
frequently met hers.

He went to Yport several times with Jeanne and the baron. One evening,
when they were on the beach, Pere Lastique accosted him, and without
removing his pipe, the absence of which would possibly have been more
remarkable than the loss of his nose, he said:

"With this wind, m'sieu le baron, we could easily go to Etretat and