which was standing wide open. He saw the girl look at him, and turn very
red. Her hostile demeanour annoyed him; and it was only the timidity
which he felt in the presence of women that restrained him from seeking
an explanation of her conduct. On this particular evening he would
certainly have addressed her if he had not detected Mademoiselle Saget's
pale face peering over the balustrade of the upper landing. So he went
his way, but had not taken a dozen steps before Claire's door was closed
behind him with such violence as to shake the whole staircase. It was
after this that Mademoiselle Saget, eager to propagate slander, went
about repeating everywhere that Madame Quenu's cousin was "carrying on"
most dreadfully with both the Mehudin girls.

Florent, however, gave very little thought to these two handsome young
women. His usual manner towards them was that of a man who has but
little success with the sex. Certainly he had come to entertain a
feeling of genuine friendship for La Normande, who really displayed a
very good heart when her impetuous temper did not run away with her. But
he never went any further than this. Moreover, the queenly proportions
of her robust figure filled him with a kind of alarm; and of an evening,
whenever she drew her chair up to the lamp and bent forward as though
to look at Muche's copy-book, he drew in his own sharp bony elbows and
shrunken shoulders as if realising what a pitiful specimen of humanity
he was by the side of that buxom, hardy creature so full of the life of
ripe womanhood. Moreover, there was another reason why he recoiled from
her. The smells of the markets distressed him; on finishing his duties
of an evening he would have liked to escape from the fishy odour amidst
which his days were spent; but, alas! beautiful though La Normande was,
this odour seemed to adhere to her silky skin. She had tried every
sort of aromatic oil, and bathed freely; but as soon as the freshening
influence of the bath was over her blood again impregnated her skin with