She gave him her cheek and the corner of her mouth, just as she had done to Desforges.
'When I am told such terrible stories as that,' he continued, 'it gives me quite a shock; but I soon recover when I think that I have been lucky enough to get a little woman like yourself. Ah! Suzanne, how I love you!'
'And yet I am sure you will scold me,' she replied, escaping from his embrace. 'The woman you think so clever, and of whom you are so proud, has been very foolish. Those diamonds,' she went on, holding up the box brought by Desforges, 'that I told you about--well, I couldn't resist them, and so I bought them.'
'But it's out of your own savings,' remarked Paul. 'What fine stones! Do you want me not to scold you? Then let me put them in.'
'You'll never be able to manage it,' she replied, holding up one of her dainty ears adorned with a plain pink pearl, which Paul slipped out deftly. Then came the turn of the other ear and the other pearl. He showed the same dexterity in putting in the diamonds, touching his beloved as gently with his strong man's hands as any girl could have done. To look at herself, Suzanne took up a small mirror set in a frame of antique silver, another present of the Baron's, and smiled. She looked so pretty at that moment that Paul drew her towards him, and, holding her in his arms, tried to obtain a kiss from her lips. As a rule, she never refused him this. Possibly, from some complication in her nature, she had managed to preserve, in spite of all, a kind of physical liking for this honest, manly fellow, whom she deceived in such a cruel fashion. What, then, had suddenly come over her, and made the usual kiss unbearable? She pushed her husband away almost roughly, saying, 'Oh! let me alone'--then, as if to mitigate the harshness of her tone, she added, 'It's ridiculous in an old married couple. Good-bye, I have hardly time to dress.'
With these words she passed into her bedroom, and so into her dressing-room. Of all the apartments in her home, this was the one in which the profound materialism that formed the basis of this woman's nature was most revealed. Her maid, Céline, a tall, dark girl with impenetrable eyes, commenced to undress her in this shrine of beauty, as gorgeously upholstered as that of any royal courtesan, and anyone who had seen Suzanne at that moment would have understood that she was ready to do anything for the luxury of living in this atmosphere of supreme refinement.