cured some work and installed herself
at a table, getting up at five o'clock in the morning on the first few
days to roll her sprigs of violets. But when she had delivered a few
gross, she stretched her arms and yawned over her work, with her hands
cramped, for she had lost her knack of stem-rolling, and suffocated,
shut up like this at home after allowing herself so much open air
freedom during the last six months. Then the glue dried, the petals
and the green paper got stained with grease, and the flower-dealer came
three times in person to make a row and claim his spoiled materials.

Nana idled along, constantly getting a hiding from her father, and
wrangling with her mother morning and night--quarrels in which the two
women flung horrible words at each other's head. It couldn't last; the
twelfth day she took herself off, with no more luggage than her modest
dress on her back and her cap perched over one ear. The Lorilleuxs, who
had pursed their lips on hearing of her return and repentance, nearly
died of laughter now. Second performance, eclipse number two, all aboard
for the train for Saint-Lazare, the prison-hospital for streetwalkers!
No, it was really too comical. Nana took herself off in such an amusing
style. Well, if the Coupeaus wanted to keep her in the future, they must
shut her up in a cage.

In the presence of other people the Coupeaus pretended they were
very glad to be rid of the girl, though in reality they were enraged.
However, rage can't last forever, and soon they heard without even
blinking that Nana was seen in the neighborhood. Gervaise, who accused
her of doing it to enrage them, set herself above the scandal; she might
meet her daughter on the street, she said; she wouldn't even dirty her
hand to cuff her; yes, it was all over; she might have seen her lying in
the gutter, dying on the pavement, and she would have passed by without
even admitting that such a hussy was her own child.

Nana meanwhile was enlivening the dancing halls of the neighborhood. She
was known from the "Ball of Queen Blanche" to the "Great Hall of Folly."
When she entered the "Elysee-Montmartre," folks climbed onto the tables
to see her do the "sniffling crawfish" during the pastourelle. As
she had twice been turned out of the "Chateau Rouge" hall, she walked
outside the door waiting for someone she knew to escort her inside. The
"Black Ball" on the outer Boulevard and the "Grand Turk" in the Rue des
Poissonniers, were