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 possessed of the devil, never twice was she in the same mind; one day she would launch some insult at me, or ignore my very existence, and the next she would meet me with languishing sheep's eyes, and cajoling laughter. When my back was turned, she would hide behind a tree, and hurl lumps of sod at my neck, or hit me on the nose with a plum; and worse than all were her goings on with any man that she could pick up, when we were out on Sundays. She took it into her head,—chiefly to annoy me, I do believe,—to flirt with Quiriace Pinon, a great chum of mine. He and I were like Orestes and Pylades, you never saw one without the other, and wherever there was anything going on, a fair, a fight, or a wedding, there we were in the midst of it. He was short and thickset, as sturdy as an oak, a good straightforward worker, and as for friendship! it would have gone hard with any one who interfered with me when he was by.

Belette singled him out from all the rest of her admirers, knowing well enough what it would mean to me; and she had no trouble at all with him, you may be sure.—A few smiles and glances out of those eyes of hers were quite enough to do his business. What son of Adam can resist the wiles of these serpents? She would put on her innocent unconscious air, turn her long neck and glance at