His eyes were bright, and he laughed rather excitedly.
“I know you’re sick she’s coming. But I can’t stand your wisdom any longer. I’m glad, do you hear? Glad. Glad. Glad! And there’s an end of it.”
“Pardon me, but that’s just what it’s not,” returned Fontenelle.
“Very well then, it isn’t. And I don’t care. I only know I want to see her again,—horribly. And she’ll be here to-night, thank goodness, and I’m going to meet her at the station.”
François shrugged his shoulders, and continued to paint.
“Where’s her hotel? Oh, the Impérial. She’s got that out of Baedeker.” He laughed.
“Come now, François. Own that sweet Anne Page in Paris will be rather nice!”
“You’d better ask her to tea here to-morrow. Your place is even more of a pig-sty than mine. We shall see Dacier and Thouret at the Lilas this evening. We can ask them then.”
“All right. But I’m not going to have you about all the time mind!”
“You won’t,” returned his friend briefly. “I can’t stand fools.”