“For sure!” replied Suzanne.
A noise started them. It was Poufaille working himself up to a fit of anger. “Troun de Diou! She was right, that lady of yours!” he cried, hammering the clay with a terrific blow of his fist.
“Hello!” Phil said in a fright; “is he going crazy?”
The sculptor’s eyes were out of his head. With formidable blows he was flattening the bust, shouting rinforzando: “Right a hundred times over—a thousand times, a million times!”
“What’s the matter, M. Poufaille?” asked Phil, rising.
“What’s the matter? To think that those pigs of the jury refused my statue of ‘Fraternity’ for the Salon! You understand my indignation,” said Poufaille, taking Phil by the lapel of his coat. “Do you understand? Hein! do you understand?”
“I—I—I—understand your indignation—I—I share it,” Phil answered between the shakes.
“It’s enough to set one crazy!” shouted Poufaille; “but—sacré mille tonnerres!—Phil, take off your collar; the sight of you with that instrument of torture chokes me!”
“Well, if that’s all that’s needed to calm you!” Phil answered, and with a turn of the hand he pulled off cravat and collar.
“À la bonne heure! I breathe!” said Poufaille.