The tall girl replaced her tray on her hip, with a sigh, and answered:
"My love affairs! Oh! they're all done with; they've gone to bed."
"What do you mean? Has Sans-Cravate been unfaithful to you?"
"Just the opposite; I tried to be to him."
"Bravo! good enough! that's frank, at all events! Agree, messieurs, that very few women who act like Bastringuette would answer as she did."
"Oh! bless my soul! I don't take four roads to get to a place. I don't know how to hide my passions. I didn't want to deceive Sans-Cravate, so I told him that I didn't love him any more."
"And he tried to force you to stay with him—to love him?"
"Not much! as if a man could force a woman to do such things when it don't suit her! You're pretty countrified still, if you think that. A woman ain't to be forced—I don't care how many keys and picklocks you have. When she don't choose to—good-day!"
"Well, then, why are you so dismal? is your new love affair going wrong already?"
"I tell you that I haven't got any love affair—that I don't propose to have any more!"