She had risen from her seat whilst speaking, and was now walking to and fro between the bed and the window, wiping as she went some specks of dust from the bright mahogany of the mirrored wardrobe and the dressing-table.

“My politics are the politics of honest folks,” said she.  “I’m grateful to the Government when business is prosperous, when I can eat my meals in peace and comfort, and can sleep at nights without being awakened by the firing of guns.  There were pretty times in ’48, were there not?  You remember our uncle Gradelle, the worthy man, showing us his books for that year?  He lost more than six thousand francs.  Now that we have got the Empire, however, everything prospers.  We sell our goods readily enough.  You can’t deny it.  Well, then, what is it that you want?  How will you be better off when you have shot everybody?”

She took her stand in front of the little night-table, crossed her arms over her breast, and fixed her eyes upon Quenu, who had shuffled himself beneath the bed-clothes, almost out of sight.  He attempted to explain what it was that his friends wanted, but he got quite confused in his endeavours to summarise Florent’s and Charvet’s political and social systems; and could only talk about the disregard shown to principles, the accession of the democracy to power, and the regeneration of society, in such a strange tangled way that Lisa shrugged her shoulders, quite unable to understand him.  At last, however, he extricated himself from his difficulties by declaring that the Empire was the reign of licentiousness, swindling finance, and highway robbery.  And, recalling an expression of Logre’s he added:  “We are the prey of a band of adventurers, who are pillaging, violating, and assassinating France.  We’ll have no more of them.”

Lisa, however, still shrugged her shoulders.

“Well, and is that all you have got to say?” she asked with perfect coolness.  “What has all that got to do with me?  Even supposing it were true, what then?  Have I ever advised you to practise dishonest courses?  Have I ever prompted you to dishonour your acceptances, or cheat your customers, or pile up money by fraudulent practices?  Really, you’ll end by making me quite angry!  We are honest folks, and we don’t pillage or assassinate anybody.  That’s quite sufficient.  What other folks do is no concern of ours.  If they choose to be rogues it’s their affair.”

She looked quite majestic and triumphant; and again pacing the room, drawing herself up to her full height, she resumed:  “A pretty notion it is that people are to let their business go to rack and ruin just to please those who are penniless.  For my part, I’m in favour of making hay while the sun shines, and supporting a Government which promotes trade.  If it does do dishonourable things, I prefer to know nothing about them.  I know that I myself commit none, and that no one in the neighbourhood can point a finger at me.  It’s only fools