Full of pity, though not understanding, Pauline endeavoured to console her. In the first place, he had thrown up Clara. It was said he still visited a lady outside, but that was not proved. Then she explained that one could not be jealous of a man in such a position. He had too much money; he was the master, after all Denise listened to her, and had she been ignorant of her love, she could no longer have doubted it after the suffering she felt at the name of Clara and the allusion to Madame Desforges, which made her heart bleed. She could hear Clara's disagreeable voice, she could see Madame Desforges dragging her about the different departments with the scorn of a rich lady for a poor shop-girl. “So you would go yourself?” asked she. Pauline, without pausing to think, cried out: “Of course, how can one do otherwise!” Then reflecting, she added: “Not now, but formerly, because now I am going to marry Baugé, and it would not be right.” In fact, Baugé, who had left the Bon Marche for The Ladies' Paradise, was going to marry her about the middle of the month. Bourdoncle did not like these married couples; they had managed, however, to get the necessary permission, and even hoped to obtain a fortnight's holiday for their honeymoon. “There you are,” declared Denise, “when a man loves a girl he ought to marry her. Baugé is going to marry you.” Pauline laughed heartily. “But my dear, it isn't the same thing. Baugé is going to marry me because he is Baugé. He's my equal, that's a natural thing. Whilst Monsieur Mouret! Do you think Monsieur Mouret can marry his saleswomen?” “Oh! no, oh! no,” exclaimed the young girl, shocked by the absurdity the question, “and that's why he ought not to have written to me.” This argument completely astonished Pauline. Her coarse face, with her small tender eyes, assumed quite an expression of maternal compassion. Then she got up, opened the piano, and softly played with one finger, “King Dagobert,” to enliven the situation, no doubt. Into the nakedness of the drawingroom, the white coverings of which seemed to increase the emptiness, came the noises from the street, the distant melopoia of a woman crying out green peas. Denise had thrown herself back on the sofa, her head against the wood-work, shaken by a fresh flood of sobs, which she stifled in her handkerchief. “Again!” resumed Pauline, turning round. “Really you are not reasonable. Why did you bring me here? We ought to have stopped in your room.”