talking about love. And how,
then, is a young man to provide for a girl when he can't provide for
himself? Let the girl alone until you begin to see the way. Don't be
ridiculous, Monsieur Jean. No woman can love a man who is ridiculous.
Jamais!"

Love is not exactly a synonyme for Reason. To be in love is in a
measure to part company with the power of ratiocination. Nevertheless,
Jean saw in an absent-minded way that Mlle. Fouchette, for whom he had
never entertained even that casual respect accorded by the Anglo-Saxon
to womanhood in general, spoke the words of sense and soberness. His
intolerant nature, that would never have brooked such freedom from a
friend, allowed everything from one who was too insignificant to
excite resentment or even reply. In the same fashion Jean was touched
by the exhibition of human interest and womanly sympathy in this waif
of civilization. And he was of too gentle a heart not to meet it with
a show of appreciation. It gave her pleasure and did not hurt him. The
fact that she was probably abandoned and vicious in no wise lessened
this consideration,--possibly increased his confidence in her
disinterested counsel.

In Paris one elbows this species every day,--in the Quartier Latin
young Frenchmen come in contact with it every night,--and without that
sense of self-abasement or disgust evoked by similar association in
the United States. The line of demarcation that separates
respectability from shame is not rigidly drawn in Paris; in the
Quartier Latin, where the youth of France and, to a considerable
extent, of the whole world are prepared for earth and heaven, it
cannot be said to be drawn at all.

By his misfortunes Jean Marot had unexpectedly fallen within her
reach. With her natural spirit of domination she had at once
appropriated the position of mentor and manager. The precocious
worldliness of her mentality amused while it sometimes astonished him.
This comparatively ignorant girl of eighteen had no hesitation in
guiding the man of more mature years, and succeeded through her
naivete rather than by force of character. The weakest of women can
dominate the strongest of men.

"Doctors never prescribe for themselves," she said, by way of
justifying her interest in him. "Is it not so, Monsieur Jean?"

"No; but they call in somebody of their own profession," he replied.

"Not if he had the same disease, surely!" she retorted.

"So you think love a disease?" he laughingly asked.