The voice of Manon interposed itself.
“Monsieur Blanc imagines that other people behave as he would behave. That is the whole trouble.”
She looked up at Paul.
“Have you touched Monsieur Blanc’s house?”
“Is it likely? The storm blew the thing down. I heard it fall about nine o’clock last night.”
Bibi shrugged his shoulders. The violence was dying out of him; it had exhausted itself for the moment; and he had a certain astuteness; the grapes were sour on this particular morning.
“You are a man of the world, monsieur,” he said to Anatole Durand; “you know that things do not happen of themselves, especially when certain people wish them to happen. But the truth remains; that fellow is a coward and a liar, and it was to madame’s interest.”
Anatole gave a little bleat on the horn.
“I think you have got a bee in your head, Monsieur Blanc. We French do not play such tricks on each other.”
“So it is three to one,” said Bibi; “and against a man who was three times wounded. Voilà! Into the ditch with you all! I’m off.”