"Oh, my dear Mees, how you wrong us!"
"Ah, but see here!" cried Betsy, and she brought him a caricature of a long, lean Frenchman with his mouth open, his tongue out, and a frog on the tip of it, ready to jump down his throat. Under it was written, "A Frenchman's Dinner."
The Emperor laughed loudly at this. "You are impertinent," he cried, pinching Betsy's ear. "I must show this to the petit Las Cases. He will not love you so much for laughing at his countrymen."
Upon this Betsy turned very red. The Emperor had touched a vulnerable point. The young Las Cases, a boy of fourteen, was now at dinner with them, and Napoleon had found that he could easily tease Betsy about him.
"He will not want a wife," continued Napoleon, "who makes fun of him;" and Betsy, inwardly enraged, could only maintain a dignified silence.
The Emperor gazed intently at his young friend, and later, when they rose from the table, he called young Las Cases.
"Come, kiss her; this is your revenge."
Betsy looked about vainly for a means of escape. But the Emperor had already closed his hands over hers, holding them so that she had no chance to get away, while young Las Cases, with a mischievous smile, approached and kissed her.
As soon as her hands were at liberty, Betsy boxed the boy's ears and awaited her chance to pay Napoleon off.
There was no inside hall to go from Napoleon's apartments to the rest of the house, and it was necessary to pass outside along a steep, narrow path, wide enough for only one at a time.