understood. You have made me very happy, mademoiselle."

Thus the husband had been secured, the marriage decided upon, during this
charming promenade among the sights of Lourdes. Raymonde had completed
her conquest, and Gerard had at last taken a resolution, realising how
gay and sensible she was, as she walked beside him leaning on his arm.

M. de Guersaint, however, had raised his eyes, and was heard inquiring:
"Are not those people up there, on that balcony, the rich folk who made
the journey in the same train as ourselves?--You know whom I mean, that
lady who is so very ill, and whose husband and sister accompany her?"

He was alluding to the Dieulafays; and they indeed were the persons whom
he now saw on the balcony of a suite of rooms which they had rented in a
new house overlooking the lawns of the Rosary. They here occupied a
first-floor, furnished with all the luxury that Lourdes could provide,
carpets, hangings, mirrors, and many other things, without mentioning a
staff of servants despatched beforehand from Paris. As the weather was so
fine that afternoon, the large armchair on which lay the poor ailing
woman had been rolled on to the balcony. You could see her there, clad in
a lace /peignoir/. Her husband, always correctly attired in a black
frock-coat, stood beside her on her right hand, whilst her sister, in a
delightful pale mauve gown, sat on her left smiling and leaning over
every now and then so as to speak to her, but apparently receiving no
reply.

"Oh!" declared little Madame Desagneaux, "I have often heard people speak
of Madame Jousseur, that lady in mauve. She is the wife of a diplomatist
who neglects her, it seems, in spite of her great beauty; and last year
there was a deal of talk about her fancy for a young colonel who is well