s kindness; by his dullness, which you call his confidence, and then,
above all, because he is my husband, instead of you. I feel him between
us, although he does not interfere with us much. And then---and
then! No, it is, after all, too idiotic of him not to guess anything! I
wish he would, at any rate, be a little jealous. There are moments when I
feel inclined to say to him: 'Do you not see, you stupid creature, that
Paul is my lover?'

"It is quite incomprehensible that you cannot understand how hateful he
is to me, how he irritates me. You always seem to like him, and you shake
hands with him cordially. Men are very extraordinary at times."

"One must know how to dissimulate, my dear."

"It is no question of dissimulation, but of feeling. One might think
that, when you men deceive one another, you like each other better on
that account, while we women hate a man from the moment that we have
betrayed him."

"I do not see why one should hate an excellent fellow because one is
friendly with his wife."

"You do not see it? You do not see it? You all of you are wanting in
refinement of feeling. However, that is one of those things which one
feels and cannot express. And then, moreover, one ought not. No, you
would not understand; it is quite useless! You men have no delicacy of
feeling."

And smiling, with the gentle contempt of an impure woman, she put both
her hands on his shoulders and held up her lips to him. He stooped down
and clasped her closely in his arms, and their lips met. And as they
stood in front of the mantel mirror, another couple exactly like them
embraced behind the clock.

They had heard nothing, neither the noise of the key nor the creaking of
the door, but suddenly Henriette, with a loud cry, pushed Limousin away
with both her arms, and they saw Parent looking at them, livid with rage,
without his shoes on and his hat over his forehead. He looked at each,
one after the other, with a quick glance of his eyes and without moving
his head. He appeared beside himself. Then, without saying a word, he
threw himself on Limousin, seized him as if he were going to strangle
him, and flung him into the opposite corner of the room so violently that
the other lost his balance, and, beating the air with his hand, struck
his head violently against the wall.

When Henriette saw that her husband was going to murder her lover, she
threw herself on Parent, seized him by the neck, and digging her ten
delicate