"Well," Sylvie ended by saying, "you may be sure that if it had been only on my own account I should not have come!" Annette studied her curiously. Her sister said, "It was Odette who sent me." "Odette?" "Yes. She asked why we never saw Aunt Annette any longer." "Really? She thought of me?" said Annette, astonished. "Who reminded her of me?" "I don't know. She saw your photograph in my room. And then you must have made an impression on her when she met you, I don't know where, on the street, or in your house perhaps. . . . Intriguer! Looking as if you weren't interested, with that secretive manner of yours! You know very well you carry away people's hearts." (She was only half joking.) Annette remembered the tender little body she had caught up as she passed, on that chance encounter, and lifted in her arms, the little dewy mouth that clung to her cheek. "Well," Sylvie went on, "I told her that we had quarrelled. She asked why. I told her to hold her tongue. This morning, in bed, when I came in to kiss her, she said to me, 'Mamma, I wish you wouldn't be angry with Aunt Annette.' I said, 'Let me alone.' But she was unhappy. So I kissed her and said, 'Do you care as much as all that for your aunt? What difference can it make to you? What an idea! Well, if you care so much about it, I shan't be angry any more.' She clapped her hands and said, When will she come?' 'When she wishes.' 'No, I want you to go straight away now and tell her to come.' So I started out. The little wretch! She does what she likes with me. . . . Now you must come. We are expecting you for dinner." Annette, with lowered eyes, said neither yes nor no. Sylvie was indignant: "I hope very much you won't have the heart to make me beg you." "No," said Annette, lifting radiant eyes that were filled with tears. They kissed each other passionately, half lovingly, half angrily. Sylvie bit Annette's ear. Annette cried out, "So you are biting now! Suppose it were I whom you call crazy. But it's you. Are you angry?" "Yes, I am," said Sylvie. "How can you expect me not to hate you? You steal from me everything I have, my husband, my daughter. . . ." Annette burst out laughing. "Keep your husband. He means nothing to me." "Nor to me either," said Sylvie. "But he is mine. I forbid anyone to touch him." "Why not put a sign on him?" "You are the one I should like to put it on, you ugly old thing! . . . What is it about you that attracts them? They all fall in love with you." "Oh, no." "Yes, they do. All of them, Odette, that silly Leopold. . . . Other people. . . . Everybody. . . . And I too! I detest you! I wish I could get rid of you. But it can't be done. There's no way of shaking you off!" They held each other's hands and laughed as they looked at each other, this time as sisters. "You silly old thing!" "You don't realize what a true word that is!"