"I have had forty francs in all the places where I have worked."
But the lady had risen. And, in a dry and ugly voice, she exclaimed:
"Well, you had better go back to them. Forty francs! Such impudence! Here are your recommendations—your recommendations from dead people. Be off with you!"
Jeanne carefully wrapped up her recommendations, put them back into the pocket of her dress, and then said, imploringly, in a timid and sorrowful voice:
"If Madame will go as high as thirty-five francs, we could come to terms."
"Not a sou. Be off with you! Go to Algeria to find again your Mme. Robert. Go where you like. There is no lack of vagabonds like you; there are heaps of them. Be off with you."
With sad face and slow step Jeanne left the bureau, after curtseying twice. I saw from her eyes and lips that she was on the point of crying.
Left alone, the lady shouted furiously: "Ah! these domestics, what a plague! It is impossible to be served these days."
To which Mme. Paulhat-Durand, who had finished sorting her cards, answered, majestic, crushed, and severe:
"I had warned you, Madame; they are all like that. They are unwilling to do anything, and expect to earn hundreds and thousands. I have nothing else to-day. All the others are worse. To-morrow I will try to find you something. Oh! it is very distressing, I assure you."