sgust on beholding her in that
sorry state.

She never remembered how she had got up all those flights of stairs.
Just as she was turning into the passage at the top, little Lalie, who
heard her footsteps, hastened to meet her, opening her arms caressingly,
and saying, with a smile:

"Madame Gervaise, papa has not returned. Just come and see my little
children sleeping. Oh! they look so pretty!"

But on beholding the laundress' besotted face, she tremblingly drew
back. She was acquainted with that brandy-laden breath, those pale eyes,
that convulsed mouth. Then Gervaise stumbled past without uttering a
word, whilst the child, standing on the threshold of her room, followed
her with her dark eyes, grave and speechless.

CHAPTER XI

Nana was growing up and becoming wayward. At fifteen years old she had
expanded like a calf, white-skinned and very fat; so plump, indeed, you
might have called her a pincushion. Yes, such she was--fifteen years
old, full of figure and no stays. A saucy magpie face, dipped in milk, a
skin as soft as a peach skin, a funny nose, pink lips and eyes sparkling
like tapers, which men would have liked to light their pipes at. Her
pile of fair hair, the color of fresh oats, seemed to have scattered
gold dust over her temples, freckle-like as it were, giving her brow a
sunny crown. Ah! a pretty doll, as the Lorilleuxs say, a dirty nose that
needed wiping, with fat shoulders, which were as fully rounded and as
powerful as those of a full-grown woman. Nana no longer needed to stuff
wads of paper into her bodice, her breasts were grown. She wished they
were larger though, and dreamed of having breasts like a wet-nurse.

What made her particularly tempting was a nasty habit she had of
protruding the tip of her tongue between her white teeth. No doubt on
seeing herself in the looking-glasses she had thought she was pretty
like this; and so, all day long, she poked her tongue out of her mouth,
in view of improving her appearance.

"Hide your lying tongue!" cried her mother.

Coupeau would often get involved, pounding his fist, swearing and
shouting:

"Make haste and draw that red rag inside again!"

Nana showed herself very coquettish. She did not always wash her feet,
but she bought such tight boots that she suffered martyrdom in St.
Crispin's prison; and if folks questioned her when she turned purple
with pain, she answered that she had the stomach ache, so as to avoid
confessing her coque