"Come, come! Let's not stay here; she may have seen me, and I don't want her to think that I still take pleasure in looking at her, in thinking about her; she would make sport of me again, and I won't have it. Come, Chicotin."
"But, for heaven's sake, look out! How you go! You are dragging me in front of the omnibuses! If you want to get us run over, I beg to be excused! I prefer something different! I say, haven't we gone far enough?—But what is it that you have against Mamzelle Violette? You run away from her, you who used to be so dead in love with her! I don't understand it at all! What on earth has the girl done to you?"
"What has she done to me? She deceived me, she let me believe that she was virtuous and honest, that she was worthy of my love, in short; but it wasn't true; and she listened to one of those fine gentlemen who made love to her, and she went to his room!"
"She! the pretty flower girl a hussy! Nonsense! It isn't true; I don't believe it! it's all talk!"
Georget was impressed by the assurance with which his friend contradicted him, and in the depths of his heart, he was conscious of a thrill of the keenest pleasure; then it was his turn to embrace Chicotin for what he had said; but he simply pressed his hand hard, as he muttered:
"You don't believe that of her. Ah, I was like you, I would not believe it; but if, in your presence, she had refused to deny such statements, you would be forced to believe! Listen, listen!"
And Georget gave his friend an exact account of what had happened the last time that he was on Boulevard du Château d'Eau.
Chicotin listened, shaking his head from time to time like a person who still doubts what he hears, and when his friend had ceased to speak, he cried:
"What does all that prove? That little squint-eyed villain,—and I'll smash him one of these days,—says a lot of nasty things about a girl who won't have anything to do with him! If he blackguards like that all the women who send him about his business, he will have his hands full."
"But that Jéricourt, that fashionable young man,—alas! he is not ugly, and you know very well that he made love to Violette!"