a corner now, and when she said she even liked that too, twitched his
cheek a little in contempt for such a lie and went on playing.

But the remark worked something in him, for five minutes later he
pursued:

"I don't see anything in the French. They ain't clean. They ain't
generous. They ain't up-to-date nor comfortable."

Fanny played out her domino.

"They don't know how to _live_," he said more violently than he had
spoken yet.

"What's living?" she said quickly. "What is it to live, if _you_ know?"

"You want to put yourself at something, an' build up. Build up your
fortune and spread it out and about, and have your house so's people
know you've got it. I want to get home and be doing it."

"Mademoiselle actually knows it!" said Julien in the doorway to the
red-haired woman in the back room, and Fanny jumped up.

The American passed four iron coins across the table. "'Tisn't going to
hinder that fortune I'm going to make," he said, smiling at last.

"What do I know?" she asked, approaching the doorway, and moving with
him into the back room.

"Madame owns a house in Verdun," said Julien, "and I tell her you know