The gentlemen are in
the drawing room."
Nana had sprung up, raging, but the names of the Marquis de Chouard and
of Count Muffat de Beuville, which were inscribed on the cards, calmed
her down. For a moment or two she remained silent.
"Who are they?" she asked at last. "You know them?"
"I know the old fellow," replied Zoe, discreetly pursing up her lips.
And her mistress continuing to question her with her eyes, she added
simply:
"I've seen him somewhere."
This remark seemed to decide the young woman. Regretfully she left the
kitchen, that asylum of steaming warmth, where you could talk and take
your ease amid the pleasant fumes of the coffeepot which was being kept
warm over a handful of glowing embers. She left Mme Maloir behind her.
That lady was now busy reading her fortune by the cards; she had never
yet taken her hat off, but now in order to be more at her ease she undid
the strings and threw them back over her shoulders.
In the dressing room, where Zoe rapidly helped her on with a tea gown,
Nana revenged herself for the way in which they were all boring her by
muttering quiet curses upon the male sex. These big words caused the
lady's maid not a little distress, for she saw with pain that her
mistress was not rising superior to her origin as quickly as she could
have desired.
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