There was a man for you! Yet he is sympathetic. His thick and curly hair, his bull neck, his calves that look like a wrestler's, his thick, intensely red, and smiling lips, testify to his strength and good humor.
He is not indifferent.
That I saw directly from his mobile, sniffing, sensual nose, and from his extremely brilliant eyes, which are at once gentle and fun-loving.
Never, I think, have I met a human being with such eyebrows, thick to the point of obscenity, and with so hairy hands.
Like most men of little intelligence and great muscular development, he is very timid.
He surveyed me with a very queer air, an air in which there was kindness, surprise, and satisfaction,—something also of salaciousness, but without impudence, something of an undressing look, but without brutality.
It is evident that Monsieur is not accustomed to such chambermaids as I, that I astonish him, and that I have made a great impression on him at the start.
He said to me, with a little embarrassment:
"Ah!
Ah! So you are the new chambermaid?"
I bent forward, slightly lowered my eyes, and then, modest and mutinous at once, I answered simply, in my gentlest voice:
"Why, yes, Monsieur."
Then he stammered:
"So you have come?
That's very good, that's very good."
He would have liked to say something further,—was trying, indeed, to think of something to say,—but, being neither eloquent or at his ease, he did not find anything.
I was greatly amused at his embarrassment. But, after a short silence, he asked:
"You come from Paris, like that?"
"Yes, Monsieur."
"That's very good, that's very good."
And growing bolder:
"What is your name?"
"Celestine, Monsieur."
He rubbed his hands,—a mannerism of his,—and went on:
"Celestine. Ah!
Ah! that's very good. Not a common name; in fact, a pretty name.
Provided Madame does not oblige you to change it.
She has that mania."
I answered, in a tone of dignified submission:
"I am at Madame's disposition."
"Undoubtedly, undoubtedly. But it is a pretty name."
I almost burst out laughing.
Monsieur began to walk up and down the room; then, suddenly, he sat down in a chair, stretched out his legs, and, putting into his look something like an apology, and into his voice something like a prayer, he asked:
"Well, Celestine,—for my part, I shall always call you Celestine,—will you help me to take off my boots?
That does not annoy you, I hope."
"Certainly not, Monsieur."
"Because, you see, these confounded boots are very difficult to manage; they come off very hard."
With a movement that I tried to make harmonious and supple, and even provocative, I knelt before him, and, while I was helping him to take off his boots, which were damp and covered with mud, I was perfectly conscious that the perfumes of my neck were exciting his nose, and that his eyes were following with increasing interest the outlines of my form as seen through my gown. Suddenly he murmured:
"Great heavens!
Celestine, but you smell good."
Without raising my eyes, I assumed an air of innocence:
"I, Monsieur?"
"Surely, you; it can hardly be my feet."
"Oh! Monsieur!"
And this
"Oh! Monsieur!" at the same time that it was a protest in favor of his feet, was also a sort of friendly reprimand,—friendly to the point of encouragement,—for his familiarity.
Did he understand?
I think so, for again, with more force, and even with a sort of amorous trembling, he repeated:
"Celestine, you smell awfully good,—awfully good."
Ah! but the old gentleman is making free. I appeared as if slightly scandalized by his insistence, and kept silence.