him sideways, and, even the best of them, could not help smiling, while
the little blackguards ran after him and said:

"Oh! oh! _Mademoiselle_, you had on a pair of breeches!"

But he pretended to hear, moreover, to guess to whom they were alluding.
He seemed as happy, and glad to look about him as he usually did, with
half open lips and smiling eyes. As usual, he wore an enormous cap with
variegated ribbons, and large petticoats as usual, he walked with short,
mincing steps, swaying and wriggling his hips and crupper, and he
gesticulated like a coquette, and licked his lips, when they called him
_Mademoiselle_, while in his head, he would have liked too have jumped
at the throat of those who called him so.

Days and months passed, and by degrees these about him forgot all about
his strange escapade, but he had never left off thinking about it, nor
trying to find out, for which he was ever on the alert--how he could
find out what were his qualities as a boy, and how could he assert them
victoriously. Really innocent, he had reached the age of twenty without
knowing anything about it, or without ever having any natural impulse to
discover it, but being tenacious of purpose, curious and dissembling, he
asked no questions, but observed all that was said and done.

Often at their village dances, he had heard young fellows boasting about
girls whom they had seduced, and praising such and such a young fellow,
and often, also, after a dance, he saw the couples go away together,
with their arms round each other's waists. They had no suspicions of
him, and he listened and watched, until, at last, he discovered what was
going on.