Then she uncovered her burning, tearless face:  “Did the father even come to see me?” she asked bitterly.  “I can’t love the child of a man who has behaved as he has!  The mere thought that it’s there, in that cradle, puts me in a rage.”

“But that dear little innocent isn’t guilty.  It’s he whom you condemn, yourself whom you punish, for now you will be quite alone, and he might prove a great consolation.”

“No, I tell you no, I won’t.  I can’t keep a child like that with nobody to help me.  We all know what we can do, don’t we?  Well, it is of no use my questioning myself.  I’m not brave enough, I’m not stupid enough to do such a thing.  No, no, and no.”

He said no more, for he realized that nothing would prevail over that thirst for liberty which she felt in the depths of her being.  With a gesture he expressed his sadness, but he was neither indignant nor angry with her, for others had made her what she was.

“Well, it’s understood, you won’t be forced to feed it,” resumed Madame Bourdieu, attempting a final effort.  “But it isn’t praiseworthy to abandon the child.  Why not trust it to Madame here, who would put it out to nurse, so that you would be able to take it back some day, when you have found work?  It wouldn’t cost much, and no doubt the father would pay.”

This time Norine flew into a passion.  “He! pay?  Ah! you don’t know him.  It’s not that the money would inconvenience him, for he’s a millionnaire.  But all he wants is to see the little one disappear.  If he had dared he would have told me to kill it!  Just ask that gentleman if I speak the truth.  You see that he keeps silent!  And how am I to pay when I haven’t a copper, when to-morrow I shall be cast out-of-doors, perhaps, without work and without bread.  No, no, a thousand times no, I can’t!”

Then, overcome by an hysterical fit of despair, she burst into sobs.  “I beg you, leave me in peace.  For the last fortnight you have been torturing me with that child, by keeping him near me, with the idea that I should end by nursing him.  You bring him to me, and set him on my knees, so that I may look at him and kiss him.  You are always worrying me with him, and making him cry with the hope that I shall pity him and take him to my breast.  But, mon Dieu! can’t you understand that if I turn my head away, if I don’t want to kiss him or even to see him, it is because I’m afraid of being caught and loving him like a big fool, which would be a great misfortune both for him and for me?  He’ll be far happier by himself!  So, I beg you, let him be taken away at once, and don’t torture me any more.”

Sobbing violently, she again sank back in bed, and buried her dishevelled head in the pillows.

La Couteau had remained waiting, mute and motionless, at the foot of the bedstead.  In her gown of dark woollen stuff and her black cap trimmed with yellow ribbons she retained the air of a peasant woman in her Sunday best.  And she strove to impart an expression of compassionate good-nature to her long, avaricious, false face.  Although it seemed to her unlikely that business would ensue, she risked a repetition of her customary speech.