"But why, Gabrielle, what reason?"
"Do you wish to know, Monsieur Giroux? Do you really wish to know?"
"Yes, certainly, Mademoiselle Taché."
"Then you shall have it. Do you know what the neighbours say, what my father says, what I say? It is that you are a good-for-nothing, Jean Baptiste Giroux. Do you understand? A good-for-nothing! There, I have said it, and it is true."
"Is that all, Gabrielle?" said Jean, in a steady voice.
"All?" exclaimed Gabrielle, turning on him in a blaze of anger. "All? Mon Dieu! It is enough, I should think."
With that she went away up the path, carrying her head very high, never once looking back to see the effect of this last crushing blow.
But, strange to say, Jean did not seem to be crushed.
"Well, that was brave of me," he said to himself. "I did not think I could do it. I am rejected, of course, and in despair. 'Good-for-nothing!' That is bad, but it is a defect that may be corrected. If that were all! Ah, if that were all! But what a vision of loveliness! What spirit! What courage! Gabrielle! Name of an Angel! Now at last I know her name. It is she, no other."
CHAPTER VI