She liked Léon to be consulted. It showed how wise he was, that an older man, even if he wasn’t very nice, should stand in need of his judgment.
It was very interesting to watch the two men walking up and down the garden. Léon slim and smart, with his little unconscious air of having arrived without premeditation at the perfection of appearance. Monsieur Gérard heavy, with a kind of sleepy uncertainty in his movements, and the effect of forcible compression about the waist. There was something to Rose very repulsive in the muffled greediness of Monsieur Gérard’s expression. He looked at once selfish and burdened; it made her nervous to see the two men together--for she had an idea that the burdens of the selfish are apt to be readily transferred.
She could not hear what they said, but she could see they were saying a tremendous amount. First Monsieur Gérard would begin emphatically with a puffy white forefinger attacking the air. His shoulders, his eyebrows, his hat were volcanically active, speech broke from him in a cascade as overwhelming and magnificent as the Tivoli Falls. Then he would pull himself up abruptly, broken in upon by another torrent from Léon. Even when they listened to each other their attention was as vivid as speech, and they were capable at moments of catching each other’s speech without discontinuing the rapid flow of their own.
Rose thought their conversation must be about an opera; and she was sure that if the opera was like their conversation it would be very exciting.
There were moments when she thought the two men were angry, there were others when the emotion between them seemed to rise up like a sudden wind and possess the garden.
On the whole it was Léon who was the most excited--he repeatedly said “Non!”--but even from the balcony Rose gathered in his passionate negative a reluctance for it to be taken as final.
They parted with great affection; there was gratitude in Monsieur Gérard’s attitude, and there was protection and soothing in that of Léon’s. “But above all,” she heard her husband say, “with women one must be practical.” They shook hands three times, then Monsieur Gérard waved his hat to Rose and hurried out of the garden.
Léon rejoined her, lighting a cigarette; his hands trembled a little, his eyes were intensely bright. It struck Rose that he was restless, more restless than usual.
He hummed a little tune to himself and then, breaking off suddenly, told her to bring him out her best hat.
“It has an air,” he explained, “quite too much of the Sunday. I want to eradicate it! A tranquil hat afflicts me! It has no power to move the heart. In a hat, one should have peril. It should not be an accident, I admit many are! But it should have an intention with a hint of danger. Pass me the scissors.”