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By Root 1309 0

at Nana’s, he started when François announced the lieutenant. The latter gaily chaffed him, treated him as a boy whose escapade he had winked at, as it was of no consequence. George, feeling sick at heart, not daring to move, blushed like a girl at the least word. He had lived but little with Philippe, who was ten years older than he. He feared him as a father, from whom one hides one’s little adventures with women; and he felt an uneasy shame on seeing him so free with Nana, laughing very loud, full of health, and thoroughly enjoying himself. However, as his brother soon called every day, George began to get used to his presence. Nana was radiant with joy. It was a last change of residence in the full fling of a courtesan’s life—a house-warming insolently given in a mansion overflowing with men and furniture.

One afternoon, when the two Hugons were there, Count Muffat called outside his regular hours; but Zoé having told him that madame was with some friends, he went away again, without seeing her, in the discreet style of a gallant gentleman. When he came back in the evening, Nana received him in the cold, angry way of an insulted woman.

“Sir,” said she, “I have given you no reason for insulting me. Understand that when I am at home you are to enter like every one else!”

The count stood with his mouth wide open. “But, my dear—” he attempted to explain.

“Because I had visitors perhaps! Yes, there were some men here. And what, pray, do you think I do with them? It causes a woman to be talked about, affecting those airs of a discreet lover, and I do not wish to be talked about!”

He had great difficulty in obtaining forgiveness. At heart he was delighted. It was by similar scenes to this that she kept him obedient and convinced of her fidelity. For some time past she had made him submit to George’s presence—a youngster who amused her, so she said. She got him to dine with Philippe, and the count was very amiable. On leaving the table, he took the young man on one side, and asked him for news of his mother. From that time the Hugons, Vandeuvres, and Muffat, openly belonged to the establishment, where they met together as intimate friends. It was more convenient. Muffat alone still discreetly timed his visits so as not to call too often, and invariably affected the ceremonious air of a stranger. At night-time, when Nana, seated on the floor on her bear-skins, pulled off her stockings, he talked in a friendly way of the other gentlemen, of Philippe especially, who was loyalty itself.

“That’s true, they’re all very nice,” said Nana, still seated on the ground and changing her chemise. “Only, you know, they see who I am. Should they for a moment forget themselves, I would have them turned out of the house at once!”

Yet, in the midst of her luxury, in the midst of that court, Nana was bored to death. She had men with her every minute of the night, and money everywhere, even in the drawers of her dressing-table amongst her combs and brushes; but that no longer satisfied her, she felt a void somewhere, a vacancy that made her yawn. Her life rolled on unoccupied, bringing each day the same monotonous hours. The morrow did not exist for her. She lived like a bird, sure of eating, ready to sleep on the first branch she came across. This certainty of being fed left her stretched out the whole day, without an effort, asleep in the midst of that idleness and that convent-like submission, as though quite hemmed in in her profession of courtesan. Going out only in a carriage, she began to lose the use of her legs. She returned to the amusements of her childhood, kissing Bijou from morning to night, killing time with the silliest pleasures in her unique expectation of the man whom she put up with in a complaisant and weary sort of way; and, in the midst of this abandonment of herself, the only anxiety she had was for her beauty. She was continually examining, washing, and perfuming herself all over, with the pride of being able to appear naked before anyone and at any moment, without feeling ashamed.

Nana rose every morning at ten