Page 76 - madame-bovary

Charles, seated opposite Emma, rubbed his hands glee-
fully.
‘How good it is to be at home again!’
Nastasie could be heard crying. He was rather fond of
the poor girl. She had formerly, during the wearisome time
of his widowhood, kept him company many an evening.
She had been his first patient, his oldest acquaintance in the
place.
‘Have you given her warning for good?’ he asked at last.
‘Yes. Who is to prevent me?’ she replied.
Then they warmed themselves in the kitchen while their
room was being made ready. Charles began to smoke. He
smoked with lips protruding, spitting every moment, re-
coiling at every puff.
‘You’ll make yourself ill,’ she said scornfully.
He put down his cigar and ran to swallow a glass of cold
water at the pump. Emma seizing hold of the cigar case
threw it quickly to the back of the cupboard.
The next day was a long one. She walked about her lit-
tle garden, up and down the same walks, stopping before
the beds, before the espalier, before the plaster curate, look-
ing with amazement at all these things of once-on-a-time
that she knew so well. How far off the ball seemed already!
What was it that thus set so far asunder the morning of the
day before yesterday and the evening of to-day? Her jour-
ney to Vaubyessard had made a hole in her life, like one of
those great crevices that a storm will sometimes make in
one night in mountains. Still she was resigned. She devout-
ly put away in her drawers her beautiful dress, down to the