"Hallo! where is my worshiper of this morning?" said Bianchon to
himself.
He said nothing; he began to doubt whether he had really seen his chief
at Saint-Sulpice. Desplein would not have troubled himself to tell
Bianchon a lie, they knew each other too well; they had already
exchanged thoughts on quite equally serious subjects, and discussed
systems de natura rerum, probing or dissecting them with the knife and
scalpel of incredulity.
Three months went by. Bianchon did not attempt to follow the matter up,
though it remained stamped on his memory. One day that year, one of the
physicians of the Hotel-Dieu took Desplein by the arm, as if to question
him, in Bianchon's presence.
"What were you doing at Saint-Sulpice, my dear master?" said he.
"I went to see a priest who has a diseased knee-bone, and to whom the
Duchesse d'Angouleme did me the honor to recommend me," said Desplein.
The questioner took this defeat for an answer; not so Bianchon.
"Oh, he goes to see damaged knees in church!--He went to mass," said the
young man to himself.
Bianchon resolved to watch Desplein. He remembered the day and hour when
he had detected him going into Saint-Sulpice, and resolved to be there
again next year on the same day and at the same hour, to see if he
should find him there again.
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