Claudet, too much excited to perceive that the young girl's impassiveness was only on the surface, said to himself: "It is all over; she accepts my departure as an event perfectly natural; she treats me as she would Theotime, the coal-dealer, or the tax-collector Boucheseiche.

A glass of wine, two or three unimportant questions, and then, good-by-a pleasant journey, and take care of yourself!" Then he made a show of taking an airy, insouciant tone.
"Oh, well!" he exclaimed, "I've always been drawn toward that kind of life.

A musket will be a little heavier than a gun, that's all; then I shall see different countries, and that will change my ideas." He tried to appear facetious, poking around the kitchen, and teasing the magpie, which was following his footsteps with inquisitive anxiety.

Finally, he went up to the old man Vincart, who was lying stretched out in his picture-lined niche.

He took the flabby hand of the paralytic old man, pressed it gently and endeavored to get up a little conversation with him, but he had it all to himself, the invalid staring at him all the time with uneasy, wide-open eyes.