and to spread out my trailing skirts. My father and Georges were already
there, talking busily.

"Have the carriages come?--yes--and about the 'Salutaris'?--very good,
then, you will see to everything--and the marriage coin--certainly,
I have the ring--Mon Dieu! where is my certificate of confession? Ah!
good, I left it in the carriage."

They were saying all this hurriedly and gesticulating like people having
great business on hand. When Georges caught sight of me he kissed my
hand, and while the maids kneeling about me were settling the skirt, and
the hairdresser was clipping the tulle of the veil, he said in a husky
voice, "You look charming, dear."

He was not thinking in the least of what he was saying, and I answered
mechanically:

"Do you think so? Not too short, the veil, Monsieur Silvani. Don't
forget the bow on the bodice, Marie."

When one has to look after everything, one needs all one's wits.
However, Georges' husky voice recurred to me, and I said to myself, "I am
sure that he has caught a cold; it is plain that he has had his hair cut
too short."

I soon got at the true state of the case.

"You have a cold, my dear fellow," said my father.

"Don't speak of it," he answered in a low voice. And still lower, and