"Because I detest young men!"
"At the age of twenty-six they are not so young as all that!"
"That may be so! but, all the same, at that age they do not exist as far as I am concerned."
"Well, well! and at what age do they begin to exist as far as you are concerned?"
She laughed.
"Very late in life!" she said, and then suddenly changing her tone, she continued: "I am glad you know M. de Bernès, because, at any rate, you will not be bored to death now this evening."
"Ah! it appears, then, that I am not to count on the other guests for entertainment?"
"Oh, no! the others—well, first of all there are the La Balues."
"Good heavens, they are alarming! Why, their children must be beginning to grow up?"
"They have even finished growing up! Louis is twenty-three, and Gisèle twenty-two."