Why, every day Poisson arrests girls who are better than she is." Gervaise said nothing, nor did she move; her eyes staring into space.
She ended by jerking her head to and fro, as if in answer to her thoughts, whilst the hatter, with a gluttonous mien, muttered: "Ah, a man wouldn't mind getting a bit of indigestion from that sort of rottenness.

It's as tender as chicken." But the grocer gave him such a terrible look that he had to pause and quiet her with some delicate attention.

He watched the policeman, and perceiving that he had his nose lowered over his little box again, he profited of the opportunity to shove some barley-sugar into Virginie's mouth.

Thereupon she laughed at him good-naturedly and turned all her anger against Gervaise.
"Just make haste, eh?
The work doesn't do itself while you remain stuck there like a street post.

Come, look alive, I don't want to flounder about in the water till night time." And she added hatefully in a lower tone: "It isn't my fault if her daughter's gone and left her." No doubt Gervaise did not hear.