"What do you want here?" he cried.
Lise was just then coming out to meet Fouan and the Delhommes. She drew near in their company, and cried in her sprightly way:
"Ah, yes! I forgot to tell you. I saw Jean this morning and asked him to come in to-night."
Her husband's face was so terribly inflamed that she added, by way of apology:
"I've a notion, Fouan, that he has a request to make of you."
"What about?" said the old man. Jean flushed and stammered, feeling very vexed that the matter should be broached so abruptly and publicly. However, Buteau violently cut him short, the smiling look which his wife cast upon Françoise having sufficed to enlighten him.
"Do you come here to make a laughing-stock of us? She's not for the likes of you, you ugly bird!"
This brutal reception gave Jean back his courage. He turned his back and addressed the old man.
"This is the matter, Fouan. It's a very simple thing. As you are Françoise's guardian, I ought to apply to you for her, oughtn't I? Well, if she will have me, I'll have her. I ask her in marriage."