He advanced towards her, his fists clenched, and she stepped back, white as a sheet, astonished at the violence of this anger, in the state of calm indifference for one another, in which they lived. But he was already recovering his self-possession, and, addressing his companion, he said: "Whoever heard of such a thing? Fellows who tumble into your home with the idea that your wife will immediately fall into their arms, and that the husband, very much flattered, will shut his eyes! It makes my blood boil. Look here, if such a thing did happen, I would strangle my wife, oh! on the spot! And this young gentleman had better not show his face here again, or I'll settle his business for him. Isn't it disgusting?" Jacques, who felt very uncomfortable at the scene, hardly knew how to look. Was this exaggerated anger intended for him? Was the husband giving him a warning? He felt more at ease when the latter gaily resumed: "As to you, I know you would very soon fling him out at the door. No matter. Séverine, bring us something to drink out of. Jacques, touch glasses with us." He patted Jacques on the shoulder, and Séverine, who had also recovered, smiled at the two men. Then they all drank together, and passed a very pleasant hour. It was thus that Roubaud brought his wife and comrade together, with an air of good friendship, and without seeming to think of the possible consequences. This outburst of jealousy became the very cause of a closer intimacy, and of a great deal of secret tenderness, strengthened by outpourings of the heart, between Jacques and Séverine. For, having seen her again two days after this scene, he expressed his pity that she should have been the object of such brutal treatment; while she, with eyes bathed in tears, confessed, with an involuntary overflow of grief, what little happiness she met with in her home. From that moment, they had found a subject of conversation for themselves alone, a complicity of friendship wherein they ended by understanding one another at a sign. At each visit, he questioned her with his eyes, to ascertain if she had met with any fresh cause for sadness. She answered in the same way, by a simple motion of the eyelids. Moreover, their hands sought each other behind the back of the husband. Becoming bolder, they corresponded by long pressures, relating, at the tips of their warm fingers, the increasing interest the one took in the smallest incidents connected with the existence of the other.