She was dreadfully wounded.  All that evening he kept chaffing her, calling her Mlle Mars.  But the harder he hit the more bravely she suffered, for she derived a certain bitter satisfaction from this heroic devotion of hers, which rendered her very great and very loving in her own eyes.  Ever since she had gone with other men in order to supply his wants her love for him had increased, and the fatigues and disgusts encountered outside only added to the flame.  He was fast becoming a sort of pet vice for which she paid, a necessity of existence it was impossible to do without, seeing that blows only stimulated her desires.  He, on his part, seeing what a good tame thing she had become, ended by abusing his privileges.  She was getting on his nerves, and he began to conceive so fierce a loathing for her that he forgot to keep count of his real interests.  When Bosc made his customary remarks to him he cried out in exasperation, for which there was no apparent cause, that he had had enough of her and of her good dinners and that he would shortly chuck her out of doors if only for the sake of making another woman a present of his seven thousand francs.  Indeed, that was how their liaison ended.

One evening Nana came in toward eleven o’clock and found the door bolted.  She tapped once—­there was no answer; twice—­still no answer.  Meanwhile she saw light under the door, and Fontan inside did not trouble to move.  She rapped again unwearyingly; she called him and began to get annoyed.  At length Fontan’s voice became audible; he spoke slowly and rather unctuously and uttered but this one word.

“MERDE!”

She beat on the door with her fists.

“MERDE!”

She banged hard enough to smash in the woodwork.

“MERDE!”

And for upward of a quarter of an hour the same foul expression buffeted her, answering like a jeering echo to every blow wherewith she shook the door.  At length, seeing that she was not growing tired, he opened sharply, planted himself on the threshold, folded his arms and said in the same cold, brutal voice: 

“By God, have you done yet?  What d’you want?  Are you going to let us sleep in peace, eh?  You can quite see I’ve got company tonight.”

He was certainly not alone, for Nana perceived the little woman from the Bouffes with the untidy tow hair and the gimlet-hole eyes, standing enjoying herself in her shift among the furniture she had paid for.  But Fontan stepped out on the landing.  He looked terrible, and he spread out and crooked his great fingers as if they were pincers.

“Hook it or I’ll strangle you!”

Whereupon Nana burst into a nervous fit of sobbing.  She was frightened and she made off.  This time it was she that was being kicked out of doors.  And in her fury the thought of Muffat suddenly occurred to her.  Ah, to be sure, Fontan, of all men, ought never to have done her such a turn!