But he was not the man to run away and, coming forward with a smile, he asked if Madame would be so kind as to allow him to dine at her table.

Noticing his jocular tone, Nana assumed her magnificently frigid demeanor and icily replied: "Sit down where you please, sir.

We are in a public place." Thus begun, the conversation proved amusing.

But at dessert Nana, bored and burning for a triumph, put her elbows on the table and began in the old familiar way: "Well, what about your marriage, my lad?
Is it getting on all right ?" "Not much," Daguenet averred.
As a matter of fact, just when he was about to venture on his request at the Muffats', he had met with such a cold reception from the count that he had prudently refrained.

The business struck him as a failure.