'Is it true, Félicie,' Fernande inquired, 'that the Ragus have been quarrelling again? The laundress told me that Ragu had half killed his wife.'
'I don't know if that's so, madame,' replied the maid, 'but I think she must have exaggerated, for I saw Josine pass the house a little while ago, and she looked no worse than she usually does.'
A pause followed, and then the maid, as she went off, added, 'All the same, it's pretty certain that he will end by killing her one of these days. He tells everybody that he means to do so.'
Silence fell again, and Fernande slowly ate her toast, absorbed the while in a gloomy reverie. But all at once, amidst the heavy stillness, Nise, letting her thoughts escape her unawares, began to hum in an undertone: 'Ragu isn't Josine's real husband; her husband is Monsieur Luc, Monsieur Luc, Monsieur Luc!'
At this her mother raised her eyes in stupefaction, and gazed at the child fixedly. 'What is that you are saying, Nise?' she exclaimed. 'Why are you saying it?'
Thunderstruck at having unwittingly hummed those words aloud, Nise lowered her face over her cup, and strove to assume an innocent air. 'Oh, for nothing! I don't know.'
'You don't know, you little falsehood-teller! You certainly did not make up those words yourself. If you repeat them somebody must have told them you.'
Nise, although she was becoming more and more disturbed, feeling that she had landed herself in a nasty scrape which might have far-reaching consequences, nevertheless held out against all evidence. 'I assure you, mamma,' said she, in the most artless manner that she could assume, 'one sings things without knowing, just as they come into one's head.'
Then Fernande, seeing her repeat her fib with all the demeanour of a genuine gamine, suddenly felt enlightened: 'It was Nanet who told you what you sang; it can only have been Nanet.'
Nise blinked; it was indeed Nanet who had told her. But she was afraid of being again scolded and punished, as on the day when her mother had caught her returning from La Crêcherie with Paul Boisgelin and Louise Mazelle by climbing over the wall, so she persisted in her falsehood: 'Oh! Nanet, Nanet—but I haven't seen him at all since you forbade it.'