"What? To work? But I like work; I am not a do-nothing. I will go back to my old life. I used to breakfast on a sou's worth of biscuit and a sou's worth of potatoes, and was well and happy. On Sundays, I dined at the Turk for thirty sous. I laughed more then in one afternoon, than in all the years I have known Tremorel." She no longer cried, nor was she angry; she was laughing. She was thinking of her old breakfasts, and her feasts at the Turk. Sauvresy was stupefied. He had no idea of this Parisian nature, detestable and excellent, emotional to excess, nervous, full of transitions, which laughs and cries, caresses and strikes in the same minute, which a passing idea whirls a hundred leagues from the present moment. "So," said Jenny, more calmly, "I snap my fingers at Hector,"--she had just said exactly the contrary, and had forgotten it--"I don't care for him, but I will not let him leave me in this way. It sha'n't be said that he left me for another. I won't have it." Jenny was one of those women who do not reason, but who feel; with whom it is folly to argue, for their fixed idea is impregnable to the most victorious arguments. Sauvresy asked himself why she had asked him to come, and said to himself that the part he had intended to play would be a difficult one. But he was patient. "I see, my child," he commenced, "that you haven't understood or even heard me. I told you that Hector was intending to marry." "He!" answered Jenny, with an ironical gesture. "He get married." She reflected a moment, and added: "If it were true, though--" "I tell you it is so." "No," cried Jenny, "no, that can't be possible. He loves another, I am sure of it, for I have proofs." Sauvresy smiled; this irritated her. "What does this letter mean," cried she warmly, "which I found in his pocket, six months ago? It isn't signed to be sure, but it must have come from a woman." "A letter?" "Yes, one that destroys all doubts. Perhaps you ask, why I did not speak to him about it? Ah, you see, I did not dare. I loved him. I was afraid if I said anything, and it was true he loved another, I should lose him. And so I resigned myself to humiliation, I concealed myself to weep, for I said to myself, he will come back to me. Poor fool!" "Well, but what will you do?" "Me? I don't know--anything. I didn't say anything about the letter, but I kept it; it is my weapon--I will make use of it. When I want to, I shall find out who she is, and then--" "You will compel Tremorel, who is kindly disposed toward you, to use violence."