Note 6 — LETTER LV.

‘You haven’t seen him then?—have you heard nothing of him?’—asked they, one of the other. More than one lady ran into her kitchen, prepared to dress6 her servant well, from head to foot, because she hadn’t been told when the broom-merchant was there. But she found no servant there, and only the broth boiling over. Madame the Syndic herself got disturbed; and interrogated, first her husband, and then the gendarme. And as they knew nothing, neither the one nor the other, down she went into the low town herself, in person, to inquire after her broom-merchant. She was quite out of brooms—and the year’s house-cleaning was to be done next week—and now no broom-merchant—je vous demande!7 And truly enough, no broom-merchant appeared; and during all the week there was a feeling of want in the town, and an enormous disquietude the next Saturday. Will he come? Won’t he come? He came, in effect; and if he had tried to answer all the questions put to him, would not have got away again till the next week. He contented himself with saying to everybody that ‘he had been obliged to go to the funeral.’