Charles, in the street buckled his spurs, his foot on the mounting stone, while she talked to him from above, picking with her mouth some scrap of flower or leaf that she blew out at him.

Then this, eddying, floating, described semicircles in the air like a bird, and was caught before it reached the ground in the ill-groomed mane of the old white mare standing motionless at the door.

Charles from horseback threw her a kiss; she answered with a nod; she shut the window, and he set off.

And then along the highroad, spreading out its long ribbon of dust, along the deep lanes that the trees bent over as in arbours, along paths where the corn reached to the knees, with the sun on his back and the morning air in his nostrils, his heart full of the joys of the past night, his mind at rest, his flesh at ease, he went on, re-chewing his happiness, like those who after dinner taste again the truffles which they are digesting.
Until now what good had he had of his life?
His time at school, when he remained shut up within the high walls, alone, in the midst of companions richer than he or cleverer at their work, who laughed at his accent, who jeered at his clothes, and whose mothers came to the school with cakes in their muffs?
Later on, when he studied medicine, and never had his purse full enough to treat some little work-girl who would have become his mistress?
Afterwards, he had lived fourteen months with the widow, whose feet in bed were cold as icicles.

But now he had for life this beautiful woman whom he adored.