You see I am
amused, and a woman's health is mainly a question whether she is
amused, whether somebody is making love to her."
"Making love! Doris, dear, there is no chance of making love to
anybody here. That is the only fault I find with the place; the sea,
the bay, the hill towns, everything I see is perfect in every detail,
only the essential is lacking. I was thinking, Doris, that for the
sake of your health we might go and spend a few days at Florac."
"My dear, it would be impossible. Everybody would know that I had been
there."
"Maybe, but I don't agree. However, I am glad that you have gone up
two pounds.... I am sure that what you need is mountain air. The
seaside is no good at all for nerves. I have a friend in Paris who
suffers from nerves and has to go every year to Switzerland to climb
the Matterhorn."
"The Matterhorn!"
"Well, the Matterhorn or Mont Blanc; he has to climb mountains,
glaciers, something of that kind. I remember last year I wrote to him
saying that I did not understand the three past tenses in French, and
would he explain why--something, I have forgotten what--and he
answered: 'Avec mes pieds sur des glaciers je ne puis m'arreter pour
vous expliquer les trois passes.'"
Doris laughed and was interested, for I had introduced her some years
ago to the man who had written this letter; and then we discussed the
_fussent_ and the _eussent, ete_, and when our language of
the French Grammar was exhausted we returned to the point whence we
had come, whether it was possible to persuade Doris to pass three days
in the hotel at Florac--in the interests of her health, of course.
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