“Should you rather have Bastien, the swineherd?” said Germain, indignantly. “A fellow with eyes shaped like those of the pigs he drives!”
“I could excuse his eyes, because he is eighteen.”
Germain felt terribly jealous.
“Well,” said he, “it’s clear that you want Bastien, but, none the less, it’s a queer idea.”
“Yes, that would be a queer idea,” answered little Marie, bursting into shouts of laughter, “and he would make a queer husband. You could gull him to your heart’s content. For instance, the other day, I had picked up a tomato in the curate’s garden. I told him that it was a fine, red apple, and he bit into it like a glutton. If you had only seen what a face he made. Heavens! how ugly he was!”
“Then you don’t love him, since you are making fun of him.”
“That wouldn’t be a reason. But I don’t like him. He is unkind to his little sister, and he is dirty.”
“Don’t you care for anybody else?”
“How does that concern you, Germain?”
“Not at all, except that it gives me something to talk about. I see very well, little girl, that you have a sweetheart in your mind already.”