"I want you here," said Perrine earnestly. "Here are the stairs. Now step up, please."
They climbed up the stairs and Perrine opened a door and gently drew M. Vulfran inside a room and closed the door again.
They stood in a suffocating, evil-smelling room.
"Who is there?" asked a weary voice.
Pressing his hand, Perrine warned M. Vulfran not to speak.
The same voice spoke:
"Get into bed, La Noyelle. How late you are."
This time M. Vulfran clasped Perrine's hand in a sign for them to leave the place.
She opened the door and they went down, while a murmur of voices accompanied them. When they reached the street M. Vulfran spoke: "You wanted me to know what that room was the first night when you slept there?"
"I wanted you to know what kind of a place all the women who work for you have to sleep in. They are all alike in Maraucourt and the other villages. You have stood in one of these dreadful rooms; all the others are like it. Think of your women and children, your factory hands, who are breathing that poisoned air. They are slowly dying. They are almost all weak and sick."