"I pray you to listen to me."
"No! it has been of no service for me to listen to you—to look at you. Up to now I have never envied any one. Well, two or three times I have surprised myself in envying—can anything be more sneaking?—in envying your face—like the Holy Virgin's! your soft, sad manner! Yes, I have envied even your fair hair, and your blue eyes. I—who have always detested fair faces, since I am a brunette—wish to resemble you!"
"No, La Louve! me?"
"A week ago I should have left my mark on any one who would have dared to tell me this. However, I do not envy you your lot; you are as sad as a Magdalen. Is it natural? speak!"
"How can you expect me to account to you for the impressions I cause?"
"Oh, you know well enough what you do with your touch-me-not air."
"But what design can I have?"
"Do you think I know? It is exactly because I cannot understand all this that I suspect you. There is another thing: until now I have always been gay or angry, but never a thinker; and you have made me think. Yes, there are some words you say which, in spite of me, have touched my heart, and make me think all manner of sad things."
"I am sorry to have made you sad, La Louve; but I do not remember to have said any—"
"Oh!" cried La Louve; "what you do is often as touching as what you say! You are so malignant!"