She, too, had made an exception in favor of this young Argentinian, abdicating her title from their first conversation.

"Call me Bertha," she said as condescendingly as a duchess of Versailles might have spoken to a handsome abbot seated at her feet.

Her husband, also protested upon hearing Desnoyers call him "Counsellor," like his compatriots.
"My friends," he said, "call me 'Captain.' I command a company of the Landsturm." And the air with which the manufacturer accompanied these words, revealed the melancholy of an unappreciated man scorning the honors he has in order to think only of those he does not possess.
While he was delivering his discourse, Julio was examining his small head and thick neck which gave him a certain resemblance to a bull dog.
In imagination he saw the high and oppressive collar of a uniform making a double roll of fat above its stiff edge.

The waxed, upright moustaches were bristling aggressively.

His voice was sharp and dry as though he were shaking out his words.