"How do men come to know about these things?... Women know better."
She was obdurate in her desire to buy a kind of Arabian chest, frightfully daubed up, set with mother-of-pearl, ivory imitation stones, and of immense size.
"You can see for yourself that it's too large, that it won't get into our house at all," I said to her.
"Do you really think so? Well how about sawing off the legs, dearie?"
And more than twenty times during the day she stopped in the middle of her conversation to ask me:
"Well, do you really think it is too large?... That beautiful chest I mean."
In the carriage, as soon as she got in, Juliette nestled close to me, offered me her lips, smothered me with caresses, happy, radiant.
"Oh! you naughty boy, who never said a word to me, and who stood just looking at me, with his sad eyes ... yes, your beautiful sad eyes that I love ... you naughty!... I had to start it all myself! ... hadn't I? ... otherwise you would have never dared, would you?... Were you afraid of me, tell me? Do you remember when you took me in your arms, that evening? I did not know where I was, I could no longer see anything.... My throat, my chest felt as though I had swallowed something very hot.... isn't that funny.... I thought I was going to die ... burned by you.... It was so sweet, so sweet!... Why, I have loved you since the first day we met.... No, I was in love with you before.... Ah, you are laughing!... You don't believe then that you can love someone without knowing or seeing him?... Well I do!... I am sure of it!..."
My heart was beating so fast, these words were so new to me, that I could not find anything to say in reply; I was choking with happiness. All I could do was to clasp Juliette in my arms, mutter some inarticulate words and weep with joy. Suddenly she became thoughtful, the furrow on her forehead deepened, she withdrew her hand from mine. I was afraid I had offended her:
"What's the matter, my Juliette?" I asked her. "Why do you look so?... Have I hurt you?"