Her stout little companion however, was more indulgent, for he clapped loudly with his podgy hands, which the pose adopted by his wife left him free to use as he liked.
“Ah! bravo, bravo!” he said, “you have hit the mark, Monsieur; you are a clever young fellow, and seem to have studied the style to address women in. My love, I hope you appreciated the compliment as I did, and to prove to this gentlemen that we are good Christians and bear no ill-will towards him, he will, I hope, if he is living in this neighbourhood and it would not be too far out of his way, accompany us home, and we will drink a bottle of old wine together, if Perrine will get one out for us from the back of the wood shed.”
“Ah! there I know you, Master Népomucène; any excuse serves you to be clinking glasses with somebody, and when no genuine occasion offers, you are very clever at ferreting out one, it does not matter where. But you know, Monsieur Magloire, that the doctor has expressly forbidden you to drink between meals.”
“True, Madame Bailiff, true,” replied her husband, “but he did not forbid me to show politeness to an agreeable young fellow such as Monsieur appears to me to be. Be lenient, I pray, Suzanne; give up this surly manner, which suits you so ill. Why, Madame, those who do not know you, would think, to hear you, that we had nearly got to quarrelling over a gown. However, to prove the contrary to Monsieur, I promise that if you can get him to go back with us, I will, the very minute we get home, give you the money to buy that figured silk dress, which you have been wishing for so long.”
The effect of this promise was like magic. Madame Magloire was instantly mollified, and as the fishing was now drawing to a close, she accepted with less ungraciousness the arm which Thibault, somewhat awkwardly we must confess, now offered her.
As to Thibault himself, struck with the beauty of the lady, and gathering from words which had fallen from her and her husband, that she was the wife of a magistrate, he parted the crowd before him with an air of command, holding his head high the while, and making his way with as much determination as if he were starting on the conquest of the Golden Fleece.
And in truth, Thibault, the bridegroom elect of Agnelette, the lover who had been so ignominiously expelled her house by the mistress of the mill, was thinking not only of all the pleasure he could enjoy, but of the proud position he would hold as the beloved of a bailiff’s wife, and of all the advantages to be drawn from the good fortune which had so unexpectedly befallen him, and which he had so long desired.
As on her side also, Madame Magloire was not only very much preoccupied with her own thoughts, but also paid very little attention to him, looking to right and left, first in front of her and then behind, as if in search of some one, the conversation would have lagged terribly as they walked along if their excellent little companion had not been at the expense of the best part of it, as he jogged along now beside Thibault and now beside Suzanne, waddling like a duck jogging home after a big feed.
And so with Thibault engaged in his calculations, and the Bailiff’s wife with her dreams, the Bailiff trotting beside them talking and wiping his forehead with a fine cambric pocket-handkerchief, they arrived at the village of Erneville, which is situated about a mile and a half from the Poudron ponds. It was here, in this charming village, which lies half-way between Haramont and Bonneuil, within a stone’s throw or two of the Castle of Vez, the dwelling of my lord the Baron, that Monsieur Magloire sat as magistrate.