"Then you must ride too?"
"Oh! that is another exercise that I adore. We will ride together—and you will see that I am not afraid, and that I have a good seat. But you don't seem to be listening to me! What in the deuce shall I talk to him about?—Poor boy, talk to me about Armantine. It is such a joy to speak of the person one loves! And you are very much in love with her, aren't you?"
I confess that at that moment I was thinking much less of Madame Sordeville. So that I replied, rather coldly:
"I was very much in love with her; but her treatment of me to-night cooled me off."
"Oh! when a man is really in love with a woman, monsieur, he doesn't cease to love her just because she flirts a little with other men; on the contrary, he often loves her all the more for it."
"Coquetry has never had that effect on me."
"Go and see Armantine in a few days, in the daytime. I'll wager that she will be very amiable to you."
"So the lady is capricious, is she?"
"Exceedingly capricious."
"That is a failing which I have never been able to endure."