IX

checked, as it were, beneath the heat and brightness of the declining day. A sailing boat in the middle of the river having spread two large triangular sails of snowy canvas, wing and wing, to catch the faintest puffs of wind, looked like an immense bird preparing to take flight.

Duroy murmured: “I adore the neighborhood of Paris. I have memories of dinners which I reckon among the pleasantest in my life.”

“And the boats,” she replied. “How nice it is to glide along at sunset.”

Then they became silent, as though afraid to continue their outpourings as to their past life, and remained so, already enjoying, perhaps, the poesy of regret.

Duroy, seated face to face with his wife, took her hand and slowly kissed it. “When we get back again,” said he, “we will go and dine sometimes at Chatou.”

She murmured: “We shall have so many things to do,” in a tone of voice that seemed to imply, “The agreeable must be sacrificed to the useful.”

He still held her hand, asking himself with some uneasiness by what transition he should reach the caressing stage. He would not have felt uneasy in the same way in presence of the ignorance of a young girl, but the lively and artful intelligence he felt existed in Madeleine, rendered his attitude an embarrassed one. He was afraid of appearing stupid to her, too timid or too brutal, too slow or too prompt. He kept pressing her hand gently, without her making any response to this appeal. At length he said: “It seems to me very funny for you to be my wife.”

She seemed surprised as she said: “Why so?”

“I do not know. It seems strange to me. I want to kiss you, and I feel astonished at having the right to do so.”