"How do you fight if you call that playing?" cried Blondet.

Nicolas gave him a murderous look.

"Speak!" said Catherine, gripping La Pechina by the forearm and
leaving a blue bracelet on the flesh. "Were not we amusing ourselves?"

"Yes, madame, we were amusing ourselves," said the child, exhausted by
her display of strength, and now breaking down as though she were
about to faint.

"You hear what she says, madame," said Catherine, boldly, giving the
countess one of those looks which women give each other like dagger
thrusts.

She took her brother's arm, and the pair walked off, not mistaking the
opinion they left behind them in the minds of the three persons who
had interrupted the scene. Nicolas twice looked back, and twice
encountered Blondet's gaze. The journalist continued to watch the tall
scoundrel, who was broad in the shoulders, healthy and vigorous in
complexion, with black hair curling tightly, and whose rather soft
face showed upon its lips and around the mouth certain lines which
reveal the peculiar cruelty that characterizes sluggards and
voluptaries. Catherine swung her petticoat, striped blue and white,
with an air of insolent coquetry.

"Cain and his wife!" said Blondet to the abbe.

"You are nearer the truth than you know," replied the priest.