If they ran till they were out of breath, it was in view of showing their white stockings and making the ribbons of their chignons wave in the breeze.

When they stopped, pretending complete breathlessness, you would certainly spot someone they knew quite near, one of the young fellows of the neighborhood.

This would make them dawdle along languidly, whispering and laughing among themselves, but keeping a sharp watch through their downcast eyelids.
They went on these strolls of a Sunday mainly for the sake of these chance meetings.

Tall lads, wearing their Sunday best, would stop them, joking and trying to catch them round their waists.

Pauline was forever running into one of Madame Gaudron's sons, a seventeen-year-old carpenter, who would treat her to fried potatoes.