"Why! I cannot be mistaken! it is the fascinating Fifine!"
"Well, well! it is Robineau! Ah! my dear friend, what a swell you have become in the three years since I saw you!"
"Still the same as ever! still amiable and piquant! What happy chance brings us together?"
"How does it happen that you dare to speak to me? For heaven’s sake, take care; you will attract attention! Suppose some of your swell friends, your princesses, should see you talking with me! Great heaven! what would they say? Skip away quick, for fear you may compromise yourself!"
"O Fifine! sarcasms! epigrams! to your old and always affectionate friend!"
"You see, I haven’t forgotten the way my old and affectionate friend dropped me when he inherited a fortune!"
"Ah! you judged me very ill, Fifine; on the contrary, it was you who lost your temper right away and refused to listen to me. You are so hotheaded! Why, I remember that you left me in the dark! That distressed me terribly; and if I had not been afraid of being received harshly, I would have laid my fortune at your feet the next day, for what I said to you was only said to test your disposition."
"It’s amazing how entirely I believe that!—But let us say no more about the past! You are well aware that all I ever cared for was to enjoy the present, without worrying about anything else; the result being, my dear fellow, that two days after your performance I gave you a successor; for you’re not the kind of a blade to inspire an incurable passion!"
"Don’t say such things, Fifine. Of course I might have guessed that another man would have touched your heart in three years."
"Another man! Well! you are generous!—Seven others, my dear friend—each more agreeable than the last, and blessed with very comfortable physiques.—I speak English now."