“It is as I heard it, monsieur. I have not wittingly intruded myself.”
“Yet you are a poet.”
“But this is prose I speak.”
“True: the prose of a nimble imagination. And, moreover, you are a student and a philosopher; and you believe this thing?”
Boppard nodded his deprecatory poll.
“Perhaps because I am also a poet, as monsieur says.”
“It is probable. And Nicette is a poet; which is why she walks, as I understand, in the odour of sanctity.”
“I do not comprehend, monsieur.”
“Why should you wish to? This vision, this revelation—it has proved profitable to Méricourt?”
“Again, I do not comprehend monsieur.”