Presently, however, Léontine grew grave. The instant success of her impromptu personation had given her an idea. She wanted revenge—a sharp revenge—on de Meneval, and she saw a way to get it.
“Listen, and be quiet,” she said to Fallière. “Victor deserves to be punished. I will tell you why. He has always represented to me that he led the quietest kind of a life here—nothing but attention to his military duties, and his evenings spent in the seclusion of his own room, with nothing but ballistics and my picture for company.”
Fallière could not refrain from a soft whistle.
“And he professed to be so glad that you were ordered to Melun, because you were so much more sedate than the other officers. He complained that they spend too much time at the Pigeon House, while he had entirely given up frequenting that fascinating place.”
Fallière whistled a little louder.
“I had the greatest difficulty in persuading him to take me to supper there the other night. Now, what do I find? That he has been throwing sand into my eyes all the time. Look!” Léontine waved her arms dramatically toward the table. “Oughtn’t he to be punished?”
“Certainly he ought,” replied Fallière, with the ready acquiescence of a bachelor who thinks that married men should be made to toe the line.
“Very well. You will help me?”
“You may count on me.”