“No, I don’t want any bouquet.”
“And I am not to look for Monsieur de Roncherolle any more?”
“It’s no use.”
“But monsieur will still employ me when he needs a messenger?”
“That goes without saying. Now go.”
Georget went away in a sad frame of mind, for at the bottom of his heart he was not content with himself. As he passed through the reception room, he made no reply when Pongo called out to him:
“Monsieur Georget, Carabi not so bad now, he no claw nothing but my ear.”
XV
A TRAP
To Georget’s mind, the best way to find an excuse for his wrongdoing was to go to her who was the cause of his committing it; so that was what he did not fail to do; and as he looked at the fascinating flower girl, he said to himself:
“As if it would have been possible for me to live without seeing her! Oh, no! I should have died of grief, and that would have made my mother more unhappy than all the rest! So I did well not to accept Monsieur Malberg’s offer.”