you. You will have to appear in court, to encounter malicious looks, to
speak before everybody and to recount that unfortunate occurrence in the
railway carriage in public. Do you not think, between ourselves, that it
would have been much better for you to have put that dirty scoundrel back
in his place without calling for assistance, and merely to change your
carriage?' She began to laugh and replied: 'What you say is quite true,
but what could I do? I was frightened, and when one is frightened one
does not stop to reason with one's self. As soon as I realized the
situation I was very sorry, that I had called out, but then it was too
late. You must also remember that the idiot threw himself upon me like a
madman, without saying a word and looking like a lunatic. I did not even
know what he wanted of me.'

"She looked me full in the face without being nervous or intimidated and
I said to myself: 'She is a queer sort of girl, that: I can quite see how
that pig Morin came to make a mistake,' and I went on jokingly: 'Come,
mademoiselle, confess that he was excusable, for, after all, a man cannot
find himself opposite such a pretty girl as you are without feeling a
natural desire to kiss her.'

"She laughed more than ever and showed her teeth and said: 'Between the
desire and the act, monsieur, there is room for respect.' It was an odd
expression to use, although it was not very clear, and I asked abruptly:
'Well, now, suppose I were to kiss you, what would you do?' She stopped
to look at me from head to foot and then said calmly: 'Oh, you? That is
quite another matter.'

"I knew perfectly well, by Jove, that it was not the same thing at all,
as everybody in the neighborhood called me 'Handsome Labarbe'--I was
thirty years old in those days--but I asked her: 'And why, pray?'