pened, daughters
of old Moineaud. Euphrasie, the younger one, she who was shouting, was
a skinny creature of seventeen, light-haired, with a long, lean,
pointed face, uncomely and malignant; whereas the elder, Norine, barely
nineteen, was a pretty girl, a blonde like her sister, but having a
milky skin, and withal plump and sturdy, showing real shoulders, arms,
and hips, and one of those bright sunshiny faces, with wild hair and
black eyes, all the freshness of the Parisian hussy, aglow with the
fleeting charm of youth.

Norine was ever quarrelling with Euphrasie, and was pleased to have her
caught in a misdeed; so she allowed her to rattle on. And it thereupon
became necessary for Beauchene to intervene. He habitually evinced great
severity in the women's workshop, for he had hitherto held the view that
an employer who jested with his workgirls was a lost man. Thus, in spite
of the low character of which he was said to give proof in his walks
abroad, there had as yet never been the faintest suggestion of scandal
in connection with him and the women in his employ.

"Well, now, Mademoiselle Euphrasie!" he exclaimed; "do you intend to be
quiet? This is quite improper. You are fined twenty sous, and if I hear
you again you will be locked out for a week."

The girl had turned round in consternation. Then, stifling her rage, she
cast a terrible glance at her sister, thinking that she might at least
have warned her. But the other, with the discreet air of a pretty wench
conscious of her attractiveness, continued smiling, looking her employer
full in the face, as if certain that she had nothing to fear from him.
Their eyes met, and for a couple of seconds their glances mingled. Then
he, with flushed cheeks and an angry air, resumed, addressing one and
all: "As soon as the superintendent turns her back you chatter away like
so many magpies. Just be careful, or you will have to deal with me!"

Moineaud, the father, had witnessed the scene unmoved, as if the two
girls--she whom the master had scolded, and she who slyly gazed at
him--were not his own daughters. And now the round was resumed and the
three men quitted the women's workshop amidst profound silence, which
only the whir of the little grinders disturbed.

When the fitting difficulty had been overcome downstairs and Moineaud
had received his orders, Beauchene returned to his residence accompanied
by Mathieu, who wished to convey Marianne's invitation to Constance. A