"Foolish things! oh! you are mistaken, mamzelle; and if you knew,--if you could guess--you would no longer doubt my love! Yes, Violette, I love you. I must pluck up courage to tell you, if you refuse to believe it; I love you to the point of--but I mustn't tell you that."
"What is it? Come, Georget, finish. You say nothing? Poor boy! you imagine that you love me; but in a month, in less than that perhaps, you will have something else in your mind. You are a child, do you know! A boy should never talk of love until he's twenty-one."
"Oh! mon Dieu! how I would like to grow old! So you don't believe me, mamzelle?"
"I say again that it's very possible that you believe what you say now; but it won't be so for long,--you are too young."
"Too young, that is the only thing you can throw in my face. What proofs do you want to make you believe in my love?"
"See, Georget, look at that little bit of a man passing over there, who looks at me in such a funny way."
"Ah! I recognize him; it's the little squint-eyed fellow. I had an idea that that creature was in love with you too; but I am not jealous of him! he's too ugly! Why do you point him out to me? I wasn't talking about him, mamzelle."
"I pointed him out to you, Georget, because that little fellow, who can hardly be any older than you, a year at most, has been prowling about here all the time for several days; he constantly bargains for flowers with me, and then he too has told me that he adores me, and has suggested carrying me off and taking me to Saint-Germain or to Versailles, or even farther, declaring that he would make me happy."
"What! that little wretch has told you all that?"
"Yes, that little fellow has told me all those foolish things; and I laughed in his face--that was the best thing for me to do. Since then, he has ceased to speak to me, but he comes here just as often and hurls savage glances at me--look, as he is doing now."
"Ah! if he treats you discourteously, I'll go and say a word to him."
"No, Georget, he's not discourteous, for he doesn't speak; we can't prevent his walking here; and besides, I am always tempted to laugh when I look at him, remembering that one day Chicotin knocked him down in such a way that he tore both knees of his trousers."