In fact, Denise was now at the summit. Her appointment as first-hand had destroyed the last resistance. If some still babbled, from that itching of the tongue which ravages every assemblage of men and women, they bowed very low before her face. Marguerite, now second-hand, was full of praise for her. Clara, herself, inspired with a secret respect before this good fortune, which she felt herself incapable of achieving, had bowed her head. But Denise's victory was more complete still over the gentlemen; over Jouve, who now bent almost double whenever he addressed her; over Hutin, seized with anxiety on feeling his position giving way under him; and over Bourdoncle, reduced at last to powerlessness. When the latter saw her coming out of the director's office, smiling, with her quiet air, and that the next day Mouret had insisted on the board creating this new department, he had yielded, vanquished by a sacred terror of woman. He had always given in thus before Mouret, recognising him to be his master, notwithstanding his escapades and his idiotic love affairs. This time the woman had proved the stronger, and he was expecting to be swept away by the disaster. However, Denise bore her triumph in a peaceable, charming manner, happy at these marks of consideration, even affecting to see in them a sympathy for the miseries of her debut and the final success of her patient courage. Thus she received with a laughing joy the slightest marks of friendship, and this caused her to be really loved by some, she was so kind, sympathetic, and full of affection. The only person for whom she still showed an invincible repugnance was Clara, having learned that this girl had amused herself by taking Colomban home with her one night as she had said she would do for a joke; and he, carried away by his passion, was becoming more dissipated every day, whilst poor Geneviève was slowly dying. The adventure was talked of at The Ladies' Paradise, and thought very droll.