“Yes, indeed, the police; for you’re mixing yourself up with politics now.”
At this Quenu sat up in bed, quite dazed and confounded by such a violent and unexpected attack.
“I mix myself up with politics! I mix myself up with politics!” he repeated. “It’s no concern of the police. I’ve nothing to do with any compromising matters.”
“No,” replied Lisa, shrugging her shoulders; “you merely talk about shooting everybody.”
“I! I!”
“Yes. And you bawl it out in a public-house! Mademoiselle Saget heard you. All the neighbourhood knows by this time that you are a Red Republican!”
Quenu fell back in bed again. He was not perfectly awake as yet. Lisa’s words resounded in his ears as though he already heard the heavy tramp of gendarmes at the bedroom door. He looked at her as she sat there, with her hair already arranged, her figure tightly imprisoned in her stays, her whole appearance the same as it was on any other morning; and he felt more astonished than ever that she should be so neat and prim under such extraordinary circumstances.
“I leave you absolutely free, you know,” she continued, as she went on arranging the papers. “I don’t want to wear the breeches, as the saying goes. You are the master, and you are at liberty to endanger your position, compromise our credit, and ruin our business.”
Then, as Quenu tried to protest, she silenced him with a gesture. “No, no; don’t say anything,” she continued. “This is no quarrel, and I am not even asking an explanation from you. But if you had consulted me, and we had talked the matter over together, I might have intervened. Ah! it’s a great mistake to imagine that women understand nothing about politics. Shall I tell you what my politics are?”
She had risen from her seat whilst speaking, and was now walking to and fro between the bed and the window, wiping as she went some specks of dust from the bright mahogany of the mirrored wardrobe and the dressing-table.