Her thin voice seemed too weak for her little bent body, and she moved with a slightly dragging step and tired gestures.
They had said of her when she was young: "What a dear little creature!"
She was now a shrivelled up old woman, very clean because of her early training, headstrong, spoiled, narrow-minded, fastidious, and easily irritated. Having become very devout, she seemed to have totally forgotten the adventures of her past.
She asked: "What do you want?"
He replied: "I find that two glasses do not make much of a show. If we could have champagne—it would not cost me more than three or four francs; we have the glasses already, and it would entirely change the aspect of the table."
Mlle Charlotte replied: "I do not see the use of going to that expense. But you are paying; it does not concern me."
He hesitated, seeking to convince himself:
"I assure you it would be much better. And then, with the cake it would make things more lively." This decided him. He took his hat and went downstairs, returning in five minutes with a bottle under his arm which bore on a large white label, ornamented with an enormous coat of arms, the words: "Grand vin mousseux de Champagne du Comte de Chatel-Rénovau."
Cachelin declared: "It cost only three francs, and the man says it is delicious."
He took the champagne glasses from the cupboard and placed them before each place.