"Enfin, Mademoiselle Fanfan, this dreadful day has come to an end at last. You look worn and fatigued, my child. It's lucky that the end of the season is close at hand, or you would what you call 'knock-up,' without fail."
"Oh, I shall do very well, Madame, thank you," replied Daisy, a little coldly; "a night's rest will quite set me up again."
"Oh, but you must have something before your night's rest, Fanfan. You are triste and tired; I see it in your eyes. You want a--tiens! what is it that little farceur, the advocate Chose, calls it?--a peg. Ha, ha! that is it! You want a sherry peg or a glass of champagne. We will go up to my room, and have some Lyons saucisson and some champagne."
At any other time Daisy would have declined this invitation; but partly because she really felt low and hipped and overwrought, and imagined that the wine would restore her, partly because she was afraid of appearing ungracious to her employer, whose increased kindness to her of late she had noticed, she now said she should be delighted, and followed Madame up the stairs.
Such a cosy little sitting-room was Madame's--low-ceilinged and odd-shaped, like an ordinary entresol carried up a story; with French furniture in red velvet, with the walls covered with engravings and nicknacks and Danton's statuettes, and the tables littered "with scrofulous French novels" in their yellow paper covers. The room was lit by one large window and a half, the other half giving light to Madame's bedroom, which led out by a door, through which, when open, as it usually was, glimpses could be obtained of the end of a brass bedstead apparently dressed up in blue muslin. There was a cloth on the table, and Madame bustled about, and, assisted by her little French maid--the page-boy retired home after customers' hours--soon produced some sausage and the remains of a Strasbourg pie, bread, butter, and fromage de Brie, and from the cellar (which was a cupboard on the landing with a patent lock, where Madame kept a small stock of remarkably good wine) a bottle of champagne.
Daisy could not eat very much, she was over-tired for that; but the wine did her good, and she talked much more freely than was her wont.
Madame Clarisse was delighted with her; a certain bitterness in the girl's tone being specially appreciated by the Frenchwoman. After some little talk she said to her:
"You still live in the same apartment, Fanfan?"
"Yes, Madame--in the same garret."
"Garret!" echoed Madame Clarisse. "Eh bien, what does it matter? Garret or palace, it makes little difference when one is young.