"Do you prefer me as I used to be?"
"Oui, Monsieur," said Blanquette.
I burst out laughing.
"She is saying 'Monsieur' to the silk hat."
"Méchant!" she scolded. "But it is true." She turned to the master and asked him how he had enjoyed his holiday.
"I never went, my little Blanquette."
"You have been in Paris all the time?"
"Yes."
"And you only send for me now? But mon Dieu!—how have you been living?"
Visions of hideous upheaval in the Rue des Saladiers floated before her mind, and she hurried forward as if there was no time to be lost in getting there. When we arrived she held up horror-stricken hands. The dust! The dirt! The state of the kitchen! The Master's bedroom! Oh no, decidedly she would not leave him again! She would only go to the country after she had seen him well started in the train with a ticket for a long way beyond Paris. There was a week's work in front of her.