And besides, you can ask me for so many other things
which I should be so happy to give you. Come now, at once, make a wish
and I will gratify it immediately."
In a frolicsome way he sought to take her hand again. But she drew back
with an air of much dignity. "No, you hear me, my dear fellow, I will
have nothing whatever to do with you--nothing, so long as I don't play
Pauline."
He understood her fully, and he knew her well enough to realise how
rigorously she would treat him. Only a kind of grunt came from his
contracted throat, though he still tried to treat the matter in a jesting
way. "Isn't she bad-tempered to-day!" he resumed at last, turning towards
Gerard. "What have you done to her that I find her in such a state?"
But the young man, who kept very quiet for fear lest he himself might be
bespattered in the course of the dispute, continued to stretch himself
out in a languid way and gave no answer.
But Silviane's anger burst forth. "What has he done to me? He has pitied
me for being at the mercy of such a man as you--so egotistical, so
insensible to the insults heaped upon me. Ought you not to be the first
to bound with indignation? Ought you not to have exacted my admittance to
the Comedie as a reparation for the insult? For, after all, it is a
defeat for you; if I'm considered unworthy, you are struck at the same
time as I am. And so I'm a drab, eh? Say at once that I'm a creature to
be driven away from all respectable houses.
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