He leaned over her and pressed her in a close embrace, while despite her unmoved features her lips wore a delicate, victorious smile.

But Dr Boutarel made his appearance.
"Well, and how's this dear child ?" he said familiarly to Muffat, whom he treated as her husband.

"The deuce, but we've made her talk!" The doctor was a good-looking man and still young.

He had a superb practice among the gay world, and being very merry by nature and ready to laugh and joke in the friendliest way with the demimonde ladies with whom, however, he never went farther, he charged very high fees and got them paid with the greatest punctuality.

Moreover, he would put himself out to visit them on the most trivial occasions, and Nana, who was always trembling at the fear of death, would send and fetch him two or three times a week and would anxiously confide to him little infantile ills which he would cure to an accompaniment of amusing gossip and harebrained anecdotes.