“Do you intend to go to Croisic to-morrow,” she asked.

“Certainly,” replied the marquise, proudly.  “I shall not fly, and I shall not succumb.”

“I play above board,” replied Camille; “I shall write to Conti.”

Beatrix became as white as the gauze of her scarf.

“We are staking our lives on this game,” she replied, not knowing what to say or do.

The violent passions roused by this scene between the two women calmed down during the night.  Both argued with their own minds and returned to those treacherously temporizing courses which are so attractive to the majority of women,—­an excellent system between men and women, but fatally unsafe among women alone.  In the midst of this tumult of their souls Mademoiselle des Touches had listened to that great Voice whose counsels subdue the strongest will; Beatrix heard only the promptings of worldly wisdom; she feared the contempt of society.

Thus Felicite’s last deception succeeded; Calyste’s blunder was repaired, but a fresh indiscretion might be fatal to him.

XIV

AN EXCURSION TO CROISIC

It was now the end of August, and the sky was magnificently clear.  Near the horizon the sea had taken, as it is wont to do in southern climes, a tint of molten silver; on the shore it rippled in tiny waves.  A sort of glowing vapor, an effect of the rays of the sun falling plumb upon the sands, produced an atmosphere like that of the tropics.  The salt shone up like bunches of white violets on the surface of the marsh.  The patient paludiers, dressed in white to resist the action of the sun, had been from early morning at their posts, armed with long rakes.  Some were leaning on the low mud-walls that divided the different holdings, whence they watched the process of this natural chemistry, known to them from childhood.  Others were playing with their wives and children.  Those green dragons, otherwise called custom-house officers, were tranquilly smoking their pipes.

There was something foreign, perhaps oriental, about the scene; at any rate a Parisian suddenly transported thither would never have supposed himself in France.  The baron and baroness, who had made a pretext of coming to see how the salt harvest throve, were on the jetty, admiring the silent landscape, where the sea alone sounded the moan of her waves at regular intervals, where boats and vessels tracked a vast expanse, and the girdle of green earth richly cultivated, produced an effect that was all the more charming because so rare on the desolate shores of ocean.

“Well, my friends, I wanted to see the marshes of Guerande once more before I die,” said the baron to the paludiers, who had gathered about the entrance of the marshes to salute him.

“Can a Guenic die?” said one of them.

Just then the party from Les Touches arrived through the narrow pathway.  The marquise walked first alone; Calyste and Camille followed arm-in-arm.  Gasselin brought up the rear.