She had hardly finished this couplet, when she exexclaimed:--
"Do you ever go to the play, Monsieur Marius?
I do.
I have a little brother who is a friend of the artists, and who gives me tickets sometimes.
But I don''t like the benches in the galleries. One is cramped and uncomfortable there.
There are rough people there sometimes; and people who smell bad."
Then she scrutinized Marius, assumed a singular air and said:--
"Do you know, Mr. Marius, that you are a very handsome fellow?"
And at the same moment the same idea occurred to them both, and made her smile and him blush.
She stepped up to him, and laid her hand on his shoulder:
"You pay no heed to me, but I know you, Mr. Marius.
I meet you here on the staircase, and then I often see you going to a person named Father Mabeuf who lives in the direction of Austerlitz, sometimes when I have been strolling in that quarter. It is very becoming to you to have your hair tumbled thus."
She tried to render her voice soft, but only succeeded in making it very deep.
A portion of her words was lost in the transit from her larynx to her lips, as though on a piano where some notes are missing.
Marius had retreated gently.
"Mademoiselle," said he, with his cool gravity, "I have here a package which belongs to you, I think.
Permit me to return it to you."