"Ah indeed, monsieur! so you choose to pick a quarrel with me in your turn, do you?" said Janille, with great animation. "Very good! this is the day for truth-telling, and I will speak, since you drive me to the wall. I tell you and I tell Monsieur Emile, to his face, that he is much too young for this rôle of friend of the family, and that this friendship had better cool down a little, or you will feel the inconveniences of it. Why, here's an instance of it this very day, and you will find it out. A young man comes and offers to marry Gilberte: we won't have him--that's all right and fully understood; but what will prevent this discarded suitor from believing and saying--if for no other reason than to be revenged--that it is because of Monsieur Emile and of the family ambition to make a rich marriage, that we will listen to nobody else? I don't say that Monsieur Emile is capable of having such thoughts, I am sure he is not. He knows us well enough to know what sort of people we are. But fools will believe it and the consequence will be that we shall be thought fools. What? we turn Monsieur Galuchet away because our girl is thought to be too young, and Monsieur Cardonnet the younger will come here every week, as if he were the only one excepted from the rule! That can never be, Monsieur Antoine! And it's of no use for you to look at me with your soft eyes, Monsieur Emile, and to kneel by me and take my hands as if you were going to make me a declaration; I love you, yes I admit it, and I shall regret you much; but I shall do my duty all the same, as I am the only one in this house with any head and foresight and decision! Yes, my boy, you must go, too, for _ma mie_ Janille isn't in her dotage yet." Gilberte had become pale as a lily again and Monsieur Antoine was angry, probably for the first time in his life. He thought Janille unreasonable, and, as he dared not rise in revolt, he pulled Sacripant's ear, who, seeing that he was out of temper, overwhelmed him with caresses and submitted to be tortured by his unconscious hand. Emile was on his knees between Janille and Gilberte; his heart overflowed and he could not keep silent. "My dear Janille," he cried at last, with impetuous emotion, "and you, noble and generous Antoine, listen to me and learn my secret at last. I love your daughter. I have loved her passionately since the first day that I saw her, and if she deigns to share my feelings, I ask her in marriage, not for Monsieur Galuchet, not for any protégé of my father, not for any of my friends, but for myself, who cannot live away from her, and who will not rise except with her consent and yours." "Come to my heart!" cried Monsieur Antoine, in a transport of joy and enthusiasm; "for you are a noble fellow and I knew that nothing could be truer and more loyal than your heart."