He had come to this. He, who did not tolerate the slightest peccadillo with the shopwomen, who turned them out for the least caprice, found himself reduced to imploring one of them not to go away, not to abandon him in his misery. He held the door against her, ready to forgive her everything, to shut his eyes, if she merely deigned to lie. And it was true, he had got thoroughly sick of girls picked up at theatres and night-houses; he had long since given up Clara and now ceased to visit at Madame Desforges's house, where Bouthemont reigned supreme, while waiting for the opening of the new shop, The Four Seasons, which was already filling the newspapers with its advertisements. “Must I go on my knees?” repeated he, almost choked by suppressed tears. She stopped him, herself quite unable to conceal her emotion, deeply affected by this suffering passion. “You are wrong, sir, to agitate yourself in this way,” replied she, at last “I assure you that all these wicked reports are untrue. This poor fellow you have just seen is no more guilty than I am.” She said this with her brave, frank air, looking with her bright eyes straight into his face. “Very good, I believe you,” murmured he. “I'll not dismiss any of your comrades, since you take all these people under your protection. But why, then, do you repulse me, if you love no one else?” A sudden constraint, an anxious bashfulness seized the young girl. “You love some one, don't you?” resumed he, in a trembling voice. “Oh! you may speak out; I have no claim on your affections. Do you love any one?” She turned very red, her heart was in her mouth, and she felt all falsehood impossible before this emotion which was betraying her, this repugnance for a lie which made the truth appear in her face in spite of all. “Yes,” she at last confessed, feebly. “But I beg you to let me go away, sir, you are torturing me.” She was now suffering in her turn. Was it not enough to have to defend herself against him? Was she to be obliged to fight against herself, against the breath of tenderness which sometimes took away all her courage? When he spoke to her thus, when she saw him so full of emotion, so overcome, she hardly knew why she still refused; and it was only afterwards that she found, in the depths of her healthy, girlish nature, the pride and the prudence which maintained her intact in her virtuous resolution. It was by a sort of instinct of happiness that she still remained so obstinate, to satisfy her need of a quiet life, and not from any idea of virtue. She would have fallen into this man's arms, her heart seduced, her flesh overpowered if she had not experienced a sort of revolt, almost a feeling of repulsion before the definite bestowal of her being, ignorant of her future fate. The lover made her afraid, inspiring her with that fear that all women feel at the approach of the male.