Occasionally he saw Louison, when the execution of a Mme. Du Barry or a Maillard drew him to the spectacle of the guillotine. Between the singular girl and himself there developed a curious attraction and repulsion, which impelled or checked his interest as regularly as the ebb and flow of the tides. When he saw her on the boulevards he felt strongly her magnetism, but in the vicinity of the guillotine she caused him a cold, almost repulsive, sensation.
So marked were her habits that a few had even bestowed on her the soubriquet of "the daughter of the guillotine." At the Cabaret de la Guillotine, where at lunch the menu bore the list of those to be executed in the afternoon, she was pointed out as the one who had never missed a performance. When discussions arose as to an execution, it was always Louison who was appealed to to decide.
This development astounded Dossonville, then annoyed him, and finally aroused him to such a pitch of disgust that one day he broke out:
"Louison, it is not right, nor human, nor decent to give way to such a curiosity. You must stop it. It is dangerous. It will become a mania. Already you seem at times inhuman."
"Others are there every day," she protested.
"But not like you. You must stop. What, does it please you to be called the daughter of the guillotine?"
"I don't know. It is always pleasant to be known."
"It is repellent."
"Don't come, then."
For a fortnight he absented himself, angry and disturbed. But in measure as she ceased to appeal to his interest she perplexed his curiosity, and he was impelled more and more to study her, seeking to understand the reasons of her indifference to suffering and the evident absence of emotion. At the end of two weeks, she met him on the boulevards with an amused smile.