“Do you feel ill?”
“Oh, no! it will pass off.”
Chichette sat down again, not on her chair, but on an old couch, covered with spots, the cushions of which looked as if they were stuffed with chips. The girl stretched herself out on it, however.
“I say, this is mighty comfortable,” she said.
Chérubin gazed amorously at her and cried:
“Oh, yes! there certainly was sympathetic attraction in our meeting. My tutor, Monsieur Gérondif, explained it to me once. He took a little piece of agate, rubbed it hard on his coat sleeve, then held it toward a straw, and the straw instantly jumped at the stone and clung to it.—‘Thus the magnet attracts iron,’ said my tutor; ‘thus sympathy draws together two hearts that were made to love and understand each other.’—Ah! madame, I am not a Pole, but I love you as dearly—more dearly, perhaps; for my inexperienced heart feels a craving for love, and if—and if——”
Chérubin paused, because it seemed to him that his words were accompanied by a dull, rumbling sound. That sound came from the couch. He had noticed that his pretty companion closed her eyes while he was speaking, but he supposed that it was from modesty. However, desirous to learn the cause of the noise he heard, he approached the young woman and saw with surprise that she was not only asleep, but was snoring heavily.
The unfortunate lover gazed for some time at his sleeping enslaver; but the snoring became louder with every instant; ere long it was like the breath of a forge bellows, and Chérubin gradually drew away; he felt that his amorous desires were vanishing; for a woman who is snoring like a Swiss inspires infinitely less passion than one whose breathing is soft and light.
Chérubin seated himself on a chair.
“She is asleep,” he said to himself; “she is even snoring. Evidently my remarks did not interest her much, as she went right off to sleep while she was listening to me! It’s very strange! This young woman has such manners and uses such language—If Daréna hadn’t assured me that she was a Polish countess, I should have thought her something very different. The idea of going to sleep while I was talking to her about my love! If that’s the way she is mad over me!—Great heaven! what snoring! Jacquinot used to snore, but not so loud as that. Perhaps I ought to wake her—and kiss her; but she is sleeping so soundly, it would be too bad. And then, I believe that listening to that monotonous noise is putting me to sleep too.”