accounts of how Nana had watched for him at the window, how
they had fallen out over a burnt dish of hash and how they had made
it up in bed after hours of silent sulking. In her desire to be always
talking about these things Nana had got to tell of every slap that he
dealt her. Last week he had given her a swollen eye; nay, the night
before he had given her such a box on the ear as to throw her across
the night table, and all because he could not find his slippers. And the
other woman did not evince any astonishment but blew out cigarette smoke
and only paused a moment to remark that, for her part, she always ducked
under, which sent the gentleman pretty nearly sprawling. Both of them
settled down with a will to these anecdotes about blows; they grew
supremely happy and excited over these same idiotic doings about
which they told one another a hundred times or more, while they gave
themselves up to the soft and pleasing sense of weariness which was
sure to follow the drubbings they talked of. It was the delight of
rediscussing Fontan's blows and of explaining his works and his ways,
down to the very manner in which he took off his boots, which brought
Nana back daily to Satin's place. The latter, moreover, used to end by
growing sympathetic in her turn and would cite even more violent cases,
as, for instance, that of a pastry cook who had left her for dead on
the floor. Yet she loved him, in spite of it all! Then came the days on
which Nana cried and declared that things could not go on as they were
doing. Satin would escort her back to her own door and would linger an
hour out in the street to see that he did not murder her. And the
next day the two women would rejoice over the reconciliation the whole
afternoon through. Yet though they did not say so, they preferred the
days when threshings were, so to speak, in the air, for then their
comfortable indignation was all the stronger.

They became inseparable. Yet Satin never went to Nana's, Fontan having
announced that he would have no trollops in his house. They used to go
out together, and thus it was that Satin one day took her friend to see
another woman. This woman turned out to be that very Mme Robert who had
interested Nana and inspired her with a certain respect ever since she
had refused to come to her supper. Mme Robert lived in the Rue Mosnier,
a silent, new street in the Quartier de l'Europe, where there were no
shops, and the handsome houses with their small