"From the age of six she began to torment little Colombel. He was small and weakly. She would lead him to the back of the park, to a place where the chestnut-trees formed an arbour; here she would spring on his back and make him carry her about, riding sometimes round and round for hours. She compressed his neck, and thrust her heels into his sides, so that he could hardly breathe. He was the horse, she was the lady on horseback. When he was tired out, and ready to drop from exhaustion, she would bite him till the blood flowed, and would cling to her seat so tightly that her nails sank into his flesh. And the ride would thus start once more. The cruel queen of six years old, borne on the back of the little boy who served her as beast of burden, hunted thus on horseback with her hair streaming in the wind. Afterwards, when they were with their parents, she would pinch him secretly, and by repeated threats would prevent him from crying or complaining. Thus in secret they led a life of their own, very different from that which was apparent to the eyes of others. When they were alone, she treated him as a toy, to be broken to fragments at her pleasure, simply to see what might be inside. Was she not the Marquise? Were not people on their knees before her? And when she was tired of tyrannising over Colombel in private, she would take a peculiar pleasure, when a number of others were present, in tripping him up, or in running a pin into his arm or leg, whilst at the same time she forbade him with a fierce glance of her black eyes to show even by the movement of an eyelid that she was to blame. "Colombel bore his martyrdom with a dull resentment. Trembling, he kept his eyes on the ground, to escape the temptation to strangle his young mistress. And yet he did not dislike being beaten; it gave him a bitter delight. Sometimes, even, he actually sought for a blow, awaiting the pain with a peculiar thrill, and feeling a certain satisfaction in the smart when she pricked him with a pin."