The involuntary hostility of some, and the too evident ridicule of others, the disagreeable surprise of all, were too palpable for him not to see it, and to be hurt by it, and it was still worse when a street urchin said to him in a jeering voice, as he danced round him: 

“Oh! oh! Mademoiselle, you wear trousers!  Oh! oh! Mademoiselle!”

And it grew worse and worse, when a whole band of these vagabonds were on his heels, hooting and yelling after him, as if he had been somebody in a masquerading dress, during the carnival.

It was quite certain that the unfortunate creature looked much more as if he were in a disguise now than he had done formerly.  By dint of living like a girl, and by even exaggerating the feminine walk and manners, he had totally lost all masculine looks and ways.  His smooth face, his long flax like hair, required a cap with ribbons, and became a caricature under the high chimney-pot hat of the old doctor, his grandson.

Mademoiselle’s shoulders, and especially her swelling stern danced about wildly in this old fashioned coat and wide trousers.  And nothing was as funny as the contrast between his quiet dress and slow trotting pace, the winning way he combed his head, and the conceited movements of his hands, with which he fanned himself, like a silly girl.

Soon the older lads and the girls, the old women, men of ripe age and even the Judicial Councilor joined the little brats, and hooted Mademoiselle, while the astonished idiot ran away, and rushed into the house with terror.  There he took his poor head between both hands, and tried to comprehend the matter.  Why were they angry with him?  For it was quite evident that they were angry with him.  What wrong had he done, and whom had he injured, by dressing as a boy?  Was he not a boy, after all?  For the first time in his life, he felt a horror for his nickname, for had he not been insulted through it?  But immediately he was seized with a horrible doubt.

“Suppose that, after all, I was a girl?”

He would have liked to ask his guardian about it but he did not want to, for he somehow felt, although only obscurely, that he, worthy man, might not tell him the truth, out of kindness.  And, besides, he preferred to find out for himself, without asking anyone.

All his idiot’s cunning, which had been lying latent up till then, because he never had any occasion to make use of it, now came out and urged him to a solitary and dark action.

The next day he dressed himself as a girl again, and made his appearance as if he had perfectly forgotten his escapade of the day before, but the people, especially the street boys, had not forgotten it.  They looked at him sideways, and, even the best of them, could not help smiling, while the little blackguards ran after him and said: 

“Oh! oh! Mademoiselle, you had on a pair of breeches!”