“What has the stomach got to do with the nose?”
“The stomach is a centre which communicates with all the organs.”
“So the nose is an organ, is it?”
“Yes.”
“Your organ is doing you a poor service at this moment.” She raises her eyes and shrugs her shoulders. “Come, Adolphe, what have I done?”
“Nothing. I’m only joking, and I am unfortunate enough not to please you,” returns Adolphe, smiling.
“My misfortune is being your wife! Oh, why am I not somebody else’s!”
“That’s what I say!”
“If I were, and if I had the innocence to say to you, like a coquette who wishes to know how far she has got with a man, ‘the redness of my nose really gives me anxiety,’ you would look at me in the glass with all the affectations of an ape, and would reply, ‘O madame, you do yourself an injustice; in the first place, nobody sees it: besides, it harmonizes with your complexion; then again we are all so after dinner!’ and from this you would go on to flatter me. Do I ever tell you that you are growing fat, that you are getting the color of a stone-cutter, and that I prefer thin and pale men?”
They say in London, “Don’t touch the axe!” In France we ought to say, “Don’t touch a woman’s nose.”