"I have some potatoes and carrots," she said, reflectively,--"so much saved. Let us see. It is not so bad,--quatre-vingt-cinq, dix, cinquante,--un franc quarante-cinq."
She made the calculation as they went up the worn stairway after the passage of the tunnel.
"Not half bad," said he, compelled to admire her cleverness.
Reaching her chamber, she deposited the entire evening investment on the hearth, proceeding to the preliminary features of preparation. She threw her hat on the bed, then pulled off the light bolero and sent it after the hat, and then she began slipping out of her skirt by suddenly letting it fall in a ring about her feet.
"Excuse me, will you? I can't risk my pretty skirt for appearances. You won't mind, monsieur? Non!"
"That's right," he said,--"a skirt is only a skirt."
He watched her with a half-amused expression as she flitted nervously about, more doll-like than ever she was, in the short yellow silken petticoat with its terminating ruffles, or cheap lace balayeuse, her blonde hair loosely drooping over her ears and caught up behind in the prevailing fashion of the quarter. She kept up a continual chatter as she opened drawers, prepared the potatoes, and arranged the little table.
Poupon was already singing in the chimney-place. Her conversation, by habit, was mostly directed to her little oil-stove, as if it were a sentient thing, something to be encouraged by flattery and restrained by reproach. It was the camaraderie of loneliness.
But to Jean, who was quick to fall back into his own reveries, her voice died away into incomprehensible jargon. Once he glanced at the sketch still on the wall and thought of her purring over her work like a satisfied cat, then the next instant again forgot her. Now and then she bestowed a keen glance on him or a passing word, but left him no time to answer or to formulate any distinct idea as to what it was about. Suddenly she pounced upon him with,--
"Oh, very well. It can be sold. And the furniture?"
"It's a fortune, monsieur," she exclaimed, with sparkling eyes. "And here I thought you were--purée!"
"No; I understand that. I once read of a rich American who committed suicide because he was suddenly reduced to two hundred and fifty thousand francs. That was very drôle, was it not?"