"I mean that in these times every one wants his arms."
"What! in perfect peace?"
"My good friend, if we were in perfect peace, you would not buy so many cuirasses, and so secretly, too. But really, the longer I look at you, the more I think I know your face. You are not Nicholas Trouchon, but still I know you."
"Silence!"
"And if you buy cuirasses—"
"Well!"
"I am sure it is for a work agreeable to God."
"Hold your tongue!"
"You enchant me!" cried the bourgeois, stretching out a long arm over the balcony and seizing the hand of the dealer.
"Then who the devil are you?" cried he, who felt his hand held as if in a vise.