"You are an 'orrible fellow! You think of nothing but diseases and wickedness. I wonder if you 'ave ever 'ad a good time yourself—ever laughed, like I do, from ze 'eart?"
He looked away from her. He felt for a moment oddly uneasy and distressed.
"No, I don't suppose I have."
"Ah, c'est dommage, mon pauvre jeune homme. But you don't like me.
What can I do?"
"I don't expect you to do anything."
"Not my business, hein? No one 'ave any business 'ere who 'ave not got an illness. Ver' well. I will 'ave an illness—a ver' leetle one. No, not ze tummy-ache. C'est vieux jeu ca. But a leetle sore throat. You know about throats, hein?"
"My specialty," he said smiling back at her with hard eyes.
"Bien, I 'ave a leetle sore throat—fatigue plutot—'e come and 'e go. I smoke too much. But I 'ave to smoke. It's no good what you say."
"I'm sure of that," he said.
He made her sit down in the white iron chair behind the screen and, adjusting his speculum, switched on the light. He was bitterly angry because she had forced this farce upon him. He felt that she was laughing all over. The pretty pinkness of her open mouth nauseated him. He thought of all the men who had kissed her, and had been ruined by her as though by the touch of a deadly plague. He pressed her tongue down with a deliberate roughness.