“I am in love with you, my dear. [The devil take me if she is not jealous now!  How shall I make her talk?] I am of the same opinion as you,” he replied, in a loud voice, “that all this talk of Lambernier’s is pure calumny.”

“There is no doubt about it.  He is well known about the place; he has a wicked tongue and watches everything that one does or says in order to report it at cross-purposes.  Mon Dieu! suppose he should make some story out of his seeing me enter these woods!”

“Madame de Bergenheim,” continued the artist, with affectation, “is certainly far above the gossip of a scoundrel of this kind.”

Reine pursed up her lips, but made no reply.

“She has too many good qualities and virtues for people to believe anything he says.”

“Oh, as to that, there are hypocrites among the Parisian ladies as well as elsewhere,” said the young girl, with a sour look.

“Bless me!” thought Marillac, “we have it now.  I’d wager my last franc that I’ll loosen her tongue.”

“Madame de Bergenheim,” he replied, emphasizing each word, “is such a good woman, so sensible and so pretty!”

“Mon Dieu! say that you love her at once, then—­that’ll be plain talk,” exclaimed Reine, suddenly disengaging herself from the arm which was still about her waist.  “A great lady who has her carriages and footmen in livery is a conquest to boast of!  While a country girl, who has only her virtue—­”

She lowered her eyes with an air of affected modesty, and did not finish her sentence.

“A virtue which grants a rendezvous at the end of three days’ acquaintance, and in the depths of the woods!  That is amusing!” thought the artist.

“Still, you will not be the first of the fine lady’s lovers,” she continued, raising her head and trying to conceal her vexation under an ironical air.

“These are falsehoods.”

“Falsehoods, when I tell you that I know what I am speaking about!  Lambernier is not a liar.”

“Lambernier is not a liar?” repeated a harsh, hoarse voice, which seemed to come from the cavity of the tree under which they were seated.  “Who has said that Lambernier was a liar?”

At the same moment, the carpenter in person suddenly appeared upon the scene.  He stood before the amazed pair with his brown coat thrown over his shoulders, as usual, and his broad-brimmed gray hat pulled down over his ears, gazing at them with his deep, ugly eyes and a sardonic laugh escaping from his lips.

Mademoiselle Reine uttered a shriek as if she had seen Satan rise up from the ground at her feet; Marillac rose with a bound and seized his whip.

“You are a very insolent fellow,” said he, in his ringing bass voice.  “Go your way!”

“I receive no such orders,” replied the workman, in a tone which justified the epithet which had just been bestowed upon him; “we are upon public ground, and I have a right to be here as well as you.”