five minutes to one
She made him feel deeply uncomfortable ; and though he was at a loss to conceive how he could be an object of interest to a sharp Parisienne he had an indefinable sense of being enclosed in a magnetic circle , of having become the victim of an incantation . If Madame Clairin could have fathomed his Puritanic soul she would have laid by her wand and her book and dismissed him for an impossible subject . She gave him a moral chill , and he never named her to himself save as that dreadful woman -- that awful woman . He did justice to her grand air , but for his pleasure he preferred the small air of Madame de Mauves ; and he never made her his bow , after standing frigidly passive for five minutes to one of her gracious overtures to intimacy , without feeling a peculiar desire to ramble away into the forest , fling himself down on the warm grass and , staring up at the blue sky , forget that there were any women in nature who did n't please like the swaying tree-tops . One day , on his arrival at the house , she met him in the court with the news that her sister-in-law was shut up with a headache and that his visit must be for HER . He followed her into the drawing-room with the best grace at his command , and sat twirling his hat for half an hour . Suddenly he understood her ; her caressing cadences were so almost explicit an invitation to solicit the charming honour of her hand .