The kiss was taken at last; but it cost Auguste dear, for he bore below his left eye the marks of two nails which had drawn blood from the Parisian dandy’s face. Thus each of the combatants was beaten, for each bore a token of defeat. But the war seemed not to be at an end. Denise, twice as red as she was before the battle, arranged her neckerchief, glaring angrily at the young man; while he put his hand to his face, and, finding blood there, wiped it with his handkerchief, looking at the girl with a less sentimental expression; for those two digs with her nails had cooled his ardor to an extraordinary degree.
“I’m glad of it,” said the girl at last; “that will teach you to try to kiss a girl against her will, monsieur.”
“I certainly didn’t expect to be treated so. The idea of disfiguring me—just for a kiss!”
“If all women did the same, you wouldn’t be so forward.”
“Thank God, they don’t all have the same ideas that you have. You hurt me terribly!”
“Oh! what troubles you the most is that it will show; you’re afraid you won’t be so pretty to look at.”
“No, I assure you that that isn’t what I am thinking about. I am sorry that I really made you angry. I realize that I was wrong. Come, Denise, let us make peace.”
“No, monsieur, no, I don’t listen to you any more.”
And the milkmaid, thinking that the young man intended to try to kiss her again, ran to her donkey, and, in order to fly more rapidly, leaped on White Jean’s back, and beat him with redoubled force. But it was the animal’s custom to return placidly to the village, browsing on whatever he found by the roadside, and not to bear his young mistress on his back. Disturbed in his daily routine by this unexpected burden, White Jean broke into a fast trot, and entered the woods despite his mistress’s efforts to make him follow the beaten path. Auguste heard the girl’s cries as she tried in vain to hold her steed, dodging with much difficulty the branches which brushed against her face every instant. Forgetting the marks that Denise had left on his cheek, Dalville followed the milkmaid’s track, in order to lead the ass back into the path; but when he heard running behind him, the infernal beast went faster than ever and rushed heedlessly into the densest part of the wood. Soon a stout branch barred the milkmaid’s path. While her mount ran beneath it, she was swept to the ground; and as she fell another branch caught her skirt; so that poor Denise fell to the ground, face downward, with her skirt over her head and consequently not where it usually was.
Auguste came up at that moment. You can imagine the sight that met his eyes; and what the skirt no longer covered was white and plump and fresh. But we must do the young man justice; instead of amusing himself by contemplating so many attractive things, he ran to Denise. She shrieked and wept and gnashed her teeth. He succeeded in rescuing her head from her petticoats, and quickly covered—what you know.