“Not to a man of esprit, like monsieur, an admirer of beauty in every form!” and M. Nioche cast a significant glance at his daughter’s Madonna.
“I can’t fancy myself chattering French!” said Newman with a laugh. “And yet, I suppose that the more a man knows the better.”
“Monsieur expresses that very happily. Hélas, oui!”
“I suppose it would help me a great deal, knocking about Paris, to know the language.”
“Ah, there are so many things monsieur must want to say: difficult things!”
“Everything I want to say is difficult. But you give lessons?”
Poor M. Nioche was embarrassed; he smiled more appealingly. “I am not a regular professor,” he admitted. “I can’t nevertheless tell him that I’m a professor,” he said to his daughter.
“Tell him it’s a very exceptional chance,” answered Mademoiselle Noémie; “an homme du monde—one gentleman conversing with another! Remember what you are—what you have been!”
“A teacher of languages in neither case! Much more formerly and much less to-day! And if he asks the price of the lessons?”
“He won’t ask it,” said Mademoiselle Noémie.