“Hegesippe! Hegesippe!” she cried, “come out and show this coquin you are a brave man.”
There was no alacrity on the part of Hegesippe, so the lady entered and fairly boosted him to the front. I stared; I gasped; my hands dropped; for the suitor, looking very much alarmed indeed, was little Monsieur Bébérose.
“Well,” I said, “you’re a fine man to try and steal a friend’s wife.”
It was now the turn of Anastasia and Madame Guinoval to gasp, for Monsieur Bébérose burst away from the grasp of the latter and rushing to me began to stammer a flood of apologies. He was so sorry; he had not known how things were; he had been deceived. “It was that woman had deceived him,” he said dramatically, pointing to Madame Guinoval.
“That woman” retorted by a terrible calm, a calm more menacing than any storm, a calm pregnant with withering contempt.
“Out of my house,” she said at last; “out, out, you sale goujat!” And Monsieur Bébérose needed no second bidding. He grabbed his hat from the rack and his cane from the stand and vanished. Then the virago turned to us. Going into the bedroom she brought Anastasia’s coat and hat. She ignored me utterly.
“Do you still,” she said, “intend to remain with this man?”
Anastasia nodded a determined head, at which the mother threw the coat and hat at her feet.
“Then go, and never let me see your face again. Never will I give my consent to your marriage in France. May my tongue wither if I ever give it.”
“Put on your hat outside,” I said to Anastasia, and pushed her out. Then I turned to the woman: