And now César was alone. He wandered about in the ploughed fields of autumn, all the time expecting to see the tall silhouette of his father waving to him from some field or other. To kill time he would drop in on neighbours, describe the accident to anyone who had not heard what had happened, and retell the story to those who had. Sometimes when he had run out of things that needed thinking about or doing he would sit down at the side of a cart track and wonder how much longer he could carry on.

He thought often of Mademoiselle Donet. He had liked her very much. He thought she was a very nice person indeed, a good, kind girl as his father had said. Yes, she was a lovely girl. A really lovely girl. He was determined to do her proud and to give her 2,000 francs in interest on capital to be settled on the child. He was rather pleased that he had to go and see her the following Thursday to sort things out with her. The thought of this brother, this new little fellow was a bit of a worry. It bothered him a little, yet at the same time it gave him a warm sort of feeling. There was a bit of kin for him there. The kid born on the other side of the blanket would never be called Hautot, but he was a bit of family with no pressure attached, a bit of his father after all.

When he found himself once more on the way to Rouen on Thursday morning, with these and similar thoughts in his head and the sound of Graindorge’s rhythmical clip-clop, his heart was lighter and his mind calmer than at any time since the accident. As he entered Mademoiselle Donet’s apartment he saw that everything was laid exactly as it had been the previous Thursday with one single exception – the crust of the bread at his place had not been removed.