Other fears kept her awake. The two ladies on the first floor received visitors up to a late hour; and sometimes a visitor mistook the floor and came banging at Denise's door. Bourras having quietly told her not to answer, she buried her face under her pillow to escape hearing their oaths. Then, her neighbour, the baker, had shown a disposition to annoy her: he never came home till the morning, and would lay in wait for her, as she went to fetch her water; he even made holes in the wall, to watch her washing herself, so that she was obliged to hang her clothes against the wall. But she suffered still more from the annoyances of the street, the continual persecution of the passers-by. She could not go downstairs to buy a candle, in these streets swarming with the debauchees of the old quarters, without feeling a warm breath behind her, and hearing crude, insulting remarks; and the men pursued her to the very end of the dark passage, encouraged by the sordid appearance of the house. Why had she no lover? It astonished people, and seemed ridiculous. She would certainly have to yield one day. She herself could not have explained why she resisted, menaced as she was by hunger, and perturbed by the desires with which the air around her was warm. One evening Denise had not even any bread for Pépé's soup, when a gentleman, wearing a decoration, commenced to follow her. On arriving opposite the passage he became brutal, and it was with a disgusted, shocked feeling that she banged the door in his face. Then, upstairs, she sat down, her hands trembling. The little one was sleeping. What should she say if he woke up and asked for bread? And yet she had only to consent and her misery would be over, she could have money, dresses, and a fine room. It was very simple, every one came to that, it was said; for a woman alone in Paris could not live by her labour. But her whole being rose up in protestation, without indignation against the others, simply averse to the disgrace of the thing. She considered life a matter of logic, good conduct, and courage.