Monsieur Follenvie was intrusted with this commission, but he returned to them almost immediately.  The German, who knew human nature, had shown him the door.  He intended to keep all the travellers until his condition had been complied with.

Whereupon Madame Loiseau’s vulgar temperament broke bounds.

“We’re not going to die of old age here!” she cried.  “Since it’s that vixen’s trade to behave so with men I don’t see that she has any right to refuse one more than another.  I may as well tell you she took any lovers she could get at Rouen—­even coachmen!  Yes, indeed, madame—­the coachman at the prefecture!  I know it for a fact, for he buys his wine of us.  And now that it is a question of getting us out of a difficulty she puts on virtuous airs, the drab!  For my part, I think this officer has behaved very well.  Why, there were three others of us, any one of whom he would undoubtedly have preferred.  But no, he contents himself with the girl who is common property.  He respects married women.  Just think.  He is master here.  He had only to say:  ‘I wish it!’ and he might have taken us by force, with the help of his soldiers.”

The two other women shuddered; the eyes of pretty Madame Carre-Lamadon glistened, and she grew pale, as if the officer were indeed in the act of laying violent hands on her.

The men, who had been discussing the subject among themselves, drew near.  Loiseau, in a state of furious resentment, was for delivering up “that miserable woman,” bound hand and foot, into the enemy’s power.  But the count, descended from three generations of ambassadors, and endowed, moreover, with the lineaments of a diplomat, was in favor of more tactful measures.

“We must persuade her,” he said.

Then they laid their plans.

The women drew together; they lowered their voices, and the discussion became general, each giving his or her opinion.  But the conversation was not in the least coarse.  The ladies, in particular, were adepts at delicate phrases and charming subtleties of expression to describe the most improper things.  A stranger would have understood none of their allusions, so guarded was the language they employed.  But, seeing that the thin veneer of modesty with which every woman of the world is furnished goes but a very little way below the surface, they began rather to enjoy this unedifying episode, and at bottom were hugely delighted —­feeling themselves in their element, furthering the schemes of lawless love with the gusto of a gourmand cook who prepares supper for another.

Their gaiety returned of itself, so amusing at last did the whole business seem to them.  The count uttered several rather risky witticisms, but so tactfully were they said that his audience could not help smiling.  Loiseau in turn made some considerably broader jokes, but no one took offence; and the thought expressed with such brutal directness by his wife was uppermost in the minds of all:  “Since it’s the girl’s trade, why should she refuse this man more than another?” Dainty Madame Carre-Lamadon seemed to think even that in Boule de Suif’s place she would be less inclined to refuse him than another.