He rose, and with quivering lip, said: "Be quiet, or I will turn you out of here."
She stammered: "Turn me out of here; turn me out of here! You will turn me out of here—you—you?" She could not speak for a moment for choking with anger, and then suddenly, as though the door of her wrath had been burst open, she broke out with: "Turn me out of here? You forget, then, that it is I who have paid for these rooms from the beginning. Ah, yes, you have certainly taken them on from time to time. But who first took them? I did. Who kept them on? I did. And you want to turn me out of here. Hold your tongue, you good-for-nothing fellow. Do you think I don't know you robbed Madeleine of half Vaudrec's money? Do you think I don't know how you slept with Susan to oblige her to marry you?"
He seized her by the shoulders, and, shaking her with both hands, exclaimed: "Don't speak of her, at any rate. I won't have it."
She screamed out: "You slept with her; I know you did."
He would have accepted no matter what, but this falsehood exasperated him. The truths she had told him to his face had caused thrills of anger to run through him, but this lie respecting the young girl who was going to be his wife, awakened in the palm of his hand a furious longing to strike her.
He repeated: "Be quiet—have a care—be quiet," and shook her as we shake a branch to make the fruit fall.
She yelled, with her hair coming down, her mouth wide open, her eyes aglow: "You slept with her!"
He let her go, and gave her such a smack on the face that she fell down beside the wall. But she turned towards him, and raising herself on her hands, once more shouted: "You slept with her!"
He rushed at her, and, holding her down, struck her as though striking a man. She left off shouting, and began to moan beneath his blows. She no longer stirred, but hid her face against the bottom of the wall and uttered plaintive cries. He left off beating her and rose up. Then he walked about the room a little to recover his coolness, and, an idea occurring to him, went into the bedroom, filled the basin with cold water, and dipped his head into it. Then he washed his hands and came back to see what she was doing, carefully wiping his fingers. She had not budged. She was still lying on the ground quietly weeping.
"Shall you have done grizzling soon?"