For a while the work was pushed forward. Figures were bandied about, garments rained thick and fast on the tables. But Clara had invented another amusement: she was teasing the messenger, Joseph, about a passion which he was said to nourish for a young lady in the pattern-room. This young lady, already twenty-eight years old, and thin and pale, was a _protégée_ of Madame Desforges, who had wanted Mouret to engage her as a saleswoman, backing up her recommendation with a touching story: An orphan, the last of the Fontenailles, an old and noble family of Poitou, had been thrown on to the streets of Paris with a drunken father; still she had remained virtuous amidst this misfortune which was the greater as her education was altogether too limited to enable her to secure employment as governess or music-mistress. Mouret generally got angry when any one recommended these broken-down gentlewomen to him; there were no more incapable, more insupportable, more narrow-minded creatures than these gentlewomen, said he; and, besides, a saleswoman could not be improvised, she must serve an apprenticeship, it was an intricate and delicate business. However, he took Madame Desforges's _protégée_ placing her in the pattern-room, in the same way as (to oblige friends) he had already found places for two countesses and a baroness in the advertising department, where they addressed wrappers and envelopes. Mademoiselle de Fontenailles earned three francs a day, which just enabled her to live in her modest room, in the Rue d'Argenteuil. It was on seeing her with her sad look and shabby attire, that Joseph's heart, very tender despite his rough soldierly manner, had been touched. He did not confess, but blushed, when the young ladies of the mantle department chaffed him; for the pattern-room was not far off, and they had often observed him prowling about the doorway. "Joseph is somewhat absent-minded," murmured Clara. "His nose is always turning towards the under-linen department." They had requisitioned Mademoiselle de Fontenailles there, and she was assisting at the trousseau counter. As the messenger continually glanced in that direction, the saleswomen began to laugh; whereupon he became very confused, and plunged into his accounts, whilst Marguerite, in order to arrest the burst of gaiety which was tickling her throat, cried out louder still: "Fourteen jackets, English cloth, second size, at fifteen francs!" At this, Madame Aurélie, who was calling out some cloaks, could not make herself heard. She interfered with a wounded air, and a majestic slowness of manner. "A little softer, mademoiselle. We are not in a market. And you are all of you very unreasonable, to be amusing yourselves with such childish matters, when our time is so precious."