“Who can have told you that?”
“Look you, my dear fellow; a man does not get to be an author without studying the human heart a little, and especially the female heart.”
“It is only too true; my wife is horribly jealous of all the women whom I knew before my marriage. But for that, do you suppose that I would not have invited you and your wife to come to see us?”
“I have guessed all that. I am sorry for you, my friend, but I bear you no ill will.”
“I am going to invite your wife for the next contradance.”
“No, for it will make your wife unhappy.”
“She has not hesitated to make me unhappy; and I choose to prove that I have no share in her spiteful remarks.”
I invited Madame Ernest for the quadrille; she accepted, saying with a laugh:
“I am very glad that you have asked me, monsieur; I thought that you did not consider that I danced well enough for you.”
“I am going to dance opposite you,” said Ernest; “then I shall be sure that you will have a vis-à-vis.”