"Voilà!" she finally cried, pointing to the discarded garments. "At least you can never say that I asked for them or didn't return them!"
"Mon Dieu!" The woman was overwhelmed,—breathless.
To be misunderstood is often the bitterest thing to bear in this life. Madame Thérèse and little Fouchette were suffering simultaneously from this evil.
"Take 'em away!"
"But listen, child! I——"
"Take 'em away!" she screamed.
Tartar rose with an ominous growl and looked from his mistress to the woman.
"We don't need 'em, do we, Tartar? No! Let them take their gall and honey with 'em. Yes! They make us tired. Yes!"
To all of these observations—somewhat heavily weighted with barrier billingsgate—Tartar showed his approval by wagging his tail knowingly and by covering the small face bent down to him with canine kisses.
"Better come away, madame," said an agent, in a low voice, to the stupefied woman thus assailed. He laughed at her discomfiture. "It is waste kindness and waste time. You can't do anything with that sort of riffraff. It's only a stray cat fed to scratch you. They're a bad lot."