She had sent for Monsieur Lheureux, and had said to him-"I want a cloak--a large lined cloak with a deep collar."

"You are going on a journey?" he asked.

"No; but--never mind. I may count on you, may I not, and quickly?"

He bowed.

"Besides, I shall want," she went on, "a trunk--not too heavy--handy."

"Yes, yes, I understand. About three feet by a foot and a half, as they

are being made just now."

"And a travelling bag."

"Decidedly," thought Lheureux, "there's a row on here."

"And," said Madame Bovary, taking her watch from her belt, "take this;

you can pay yourself out of it."

But the tradesman cried out that she was wrong; they knew one another;

did he doubt her? What childishness!

She insisted, however, on his taking at least the chain, and Lheureux

had already put it in his pocket and was going, when she called him

back.

"You will leave everything at your place. As to the cloak"--she seemed

to be reflecting--"do not bring it either; you can give me the maker's

address, and tell him to have it ready for me."

It was the next month that they were to run away. She was to leave

Yonville as if she was going on some business to Rouen. Rodolphe would

have booked the seats, procured the passports, and even have written to

Paris in order to have the whole mail-coach reserved for them as far as

Marseilles, where they would buy a carriage, and go on thence without

stopping to Genoa. She would take care to send her luggage to Lheureux

whence it would be taken direct to the "Hirondelle," so that no one

would have any suspicion. And in all this there never was any allusion

to the child. Rodolphe avoided speaking of her; perhaps he no longer

thought about it.

He wished to have two more weeks before him to arrange some affairs;

then at the end of a week he wanted two more; then he said he was ill;

next he went on a journey. The month of August passed, and, after all

these delays, they decided that it was to be irrevocably fixed for the

4th September--a Monday.

At length the Saturday before arrived.

Rodolphe came in the evening earlier than usual.

"Everything is ready?" she asked him.

"Yes."

Then they walked round a garden-bed, and went to sit down near the

terrace on the kerb-stone of the wall.




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