莫泊桑短篇小说集英文版

1. 急需莫泊桑简介，内容简短，中文和英文的都要，并且内容一致

【莫泊桑简介】全名居基·德·莫泊桑(Guy de Maupassant 1850年8月5日－1893年7月6日) ：19世
莫泊桑于1850年8月出生在法国西北部诺曼底省狄埃卜城附近一个没落的贵族家庭。他的祖辈都是贵族，但到他父亲这一代时没落了，父亲做了交易所的经纪人。他的母亲出身于书香门第，爱好文学，经常对文学作品发表议论，见解独到。莫泊桑出生不久，他的父母由于经常闹矛盾而分居了，他和母亲住在海边的一个别墅里。幼年时的莫泊桑喜欢在苹果园里游玩，在草原观看打猎，喜欢和农民、渔夫、船夫、猎人在一起聊天、干活，这些经历使莫泊桑从小就熟悉了农村生活。从童年时代起，母亲就培养他写诗，到儿子成为著名作家时，她仍然是莫泊桑的文学顾问、批评者和助手，所以他的母亲是他走上文学创作道路的第一位老师。另一位为莫泊桑走上文学道路打下基础的是他13岁在卢昂中学学习时的文学教师路易·布耶。路易·布耶是一个著名的巴那派诗人，他经常指导莫泊桑进行多种体裁的文学创作。...
1870年，莫泊桑中学毕业后到巴黎入大学学习法律。这一年普法战争爆发，他应征入伍。在军队中，他亲眼目睹了危难中的祖国和在血泊中呻吟的兵士，心里十分难过，他要把自己的所见所闻写下来，以激发人们的爱国热情。1871年，战争结束后，莫泊桑退役回到巴黎。
1878年，他在教育部工作之余开始从事写作。那时，他的舅舅的同窗好友，大文学家福楼拜成为莫泊桑文学上的导师，他们两人结下了亲如父子的师徒关系。福楼拜决心把自己创作的经验传授给莫泊桑。莫泊桑非常尊重严师的教诲，每篇习作都要送给福楼拜审阅。福楼拜一丝不苟地为他修改习作，对莫泊桑的不少作品表示赞赏，但劝他不要急于发表。因此，在70年代里，莫泊桑的著述很多，但发表的却很少，这是他文学创作的准备阶段。他以《羊脂球》(1880)入选《梅塘晚会》短篇小说集，一跃登上法国文坛，其创作盛期是80年代。10年间，他创作了6部长篇小说《一生》卖清(1883)、《俊友》(1885)、《温 泉》(1886)、《皮埃尔和若望》、《像死一般坚强》（1889）、《我们的心》（1890）。这些作品揭露了第三共和国的黑暗内幕内阁要员从金融巨头的利益出发，欺骗议会和民众，发动掠夺非洲殖民地摩洛哥的帝国主义战争；抨击了统治集团的腐朽、贪婪、尔虞我诈的荒淫无耻。莫泊桑还创作了350多部中短篇小说，在揭露上层统治者及其毒化下的社会风气的同时，对被侮辱被损害的小人物寄予深切同情。
短篇的主题大致可归纳为三个方面第一是讽刺虚荣心和拜金主义，如《项链》、《我的叔叔于勒》；第二是描写劳动人民的悲惨遭遇，赞颂其正直、淳朴、宽厚的品格，如《归来》；第三是描写普法战争，反映法国人民爱国情绪，如《羊脂球》。莫泊桑短篇小说布局结构的精巧。典型细节的选用、叙事抒情的手法以及行云流水般的自然文笔，都给后世作家提供了楷模。
另外，他敏锐的观察也是令人称道的，自从他拜师福楼拜之后，每逢星期日就带着新习作，从巴黎长途奔波到鲁昂近郊的福楼拜的住处去，聆听福楼拜对他前一周交上的习作的点评。福楼拜对他的要求非常严格，首先要求他敏锐透彻的观察事物。莫泊桑遵从师教，逐渐善于发现别人没有发现过和没有写过的特点”，后来，当他在谈到作家应该细致、敏锐的观察事物时，说必须详细的观察你想要表达的一切东西，时间要长，而且要全神贯注，才能从其中发现迄今还没有人看到与说过的那些方面。为了描写烧的很旺的火或平地上的一棵树，我们就需要站在这堆火或这棵树的面前，一直到我们觉得渗耐它们不再跟别的火焰和别的树木一样为止。”
一次，福楼拜还建议莫泊桑做这样的锻炼骑马出去跑一圈，一两个钟头之后回来，把自己所看到的一切记下来。莫泊桑按照这个办法锻炼自己的观察力有一年之久。此外福楼拜还让他听街上的马车声来训练观察力。 1880年，莫泊桑的成名作《羊脂球》发表了，它使莫泊桑一鸣惊人，读者称他是文坛上的一颗新星。从此，他一跃登上了法国文坛。莫泊桑的绝大部分作品是从这时到1890年的10年间创作的。此间，他写成短篇小说约300篇，长篇小说6部，还写了3部游记、1部诗集及其它杂文。
莫泊桑的作品对后世产生了极中喊前大影响。除了《羊脂球》（1880）,这一短篇文库中的珍品之外，莫泊桑还创作了包括《一家人》（1881）、《我的叔叔于勒》（1883）、《米隆老爹》（1883）、《两个朋友》（1883）、《项链》（1884）及《西蒙的爸爸》、《珠宝》、《小步舞》、《珍珠小姐》等在内的一大批脍炙人口、思想性和艺术性完美结合的短篇佳作。 莫泊桑的长篇小说也达到比较高的成就。他共创作了6部长篇：《一生》（1883）、《俊友》（又译《漂亮朋友》，1885）、《温泉》（1886）、《皮埃尔和若望》（1887）、《像死一般坚强》（1889）和《我们的心》（1890），其中前两部已列入世界长篇小说名著之林。
屠格涅夫认为他是19世纪末法国文坛上“最卓越的天才”。托尔斯泰认为他的小说具有“形式的美感”和“鲜明的爱憎”，他之所以是天才，是因为他“不是按照他所希望看到的样子而是照事物本来的样子来看事物”，因而“就能揭发暴露事物，而且使得人们爱那值得爱的，恨那值得恨的事物。”左拉：他的作品“无限地丰富多彩，无不精彩绝妙，令人叹为观止”。恩格斯：“应该向莫泊桑脱帽致敬。”
因为他的短篇驰名中外，他在长篇小说创作上的成就以至于因此被湮没。其实，他不但是个短篇小说的高手，在长篇小说创作上也颇有建树。他继承了巴尔扎克、司汤达、福楼拜的现实主义传统，在心理描写上又开拓出新路。《漂亮朋友》就是他的一部长篇代表性作品。莫泊桑不满足于短篇小说所取得的成就，在他声誉鹊起后，他经常涉足上流社会，开阔了眼界，便想到从更广阔的背景上去反映社会现实，长篇小说给他提供了一个得心应手的工具。从第一部长篇《一生》到第二部长篇《漂亮朋友》，他的笔触已经从个人生活投向新闻界和政界，具有丰富得多的内容，堪称一部揭露深刻、讽刺犀利的社会小说。
他勤奋地创作了一生，由于过度劳累得了精神错乱症，后来被送进巴黎的一家疯人院。1893年7月6日莫泊桑逝世，年仅43岁。
他虽然只活了43岁，却留下了300多篇中短篇小说与6部长篇小说，而且在相当长的一段时期里，是带病之躯进行写作的，这已经是可令人惊叹的了；何况，一两个世纪以来，他的小说创作一直保持着不朽的艺术魅力。他在短篇小说方面的巨大成就，是他赢得了“世界短篇小说巨匠”的美名，他的长篇小说也拥有亿万读者，并不断被改编成电影，风靡全球。

2. 适合高中生读的英文小说。

建议还是想看 安徒生和格林童话英文版
接下来可以看 小王子和书虫系列
莫泊桑小说集，短篇的，不会枯燥
秘密花园
圣诞欢歌
金银岛
雾都孤儿
简爱
茶花女
傲慢与偏见
鲁宾逊漂流记
爱丽丝漫游奇境记
如果喜欢哈利波特系列，也可以读，关键就是兴趣，我读一本就不喜，不太爱魔幻吧....
希望满意

3. 推荐几本外国的短篇小说集!

莫泊桑短篇小说集
契诃夫短篇小说集
茨威格短篇小说集
马克.吐温短篇小说集
窃贼(阿·康帕尼尔)
情书(岩井俊二)
永远占有(格雷厄姆·格林)
化石街(岛田庄司)
棋逢对手(西瑞尔·哈尔)
首领(卡拉维洛夫)
热爱生命(杰克·伦敦)
蚂蚁
(博里斯·维昂)
蠢猪
(马莱巴)
品酒
(罗·达尔)
打不碎的鸡蛋
(马莱巴)
劳驾，快点！(图戈依)
品酒
(罗·达尔)

4. 推荐几本英文版外国名著适合高中生看得

哈姆雷特，堂吉诃德，巴黎圣母院，欧也妮葛朗台，复活，普希金诗选，泰戈尔诗选，莫泊桑短篇小说集，契诃夫短篇小说集，欧亨利短篇小说集…

5. 莫泊桑有没有小说英文名是The Unknown

有啊，这在莫泊桑Maupassant的短篇小说集里，知名度不如他其他一些主要作品，如羊脂球等

6. 莫泊桑《珠宝》 故事英文简介。

The middle class family londin woman has two kind of hobby for husband dissatisfaction, one is love the theatre, two love costume jewelry. One winter night she came back from the theatre, and was killed, and died of pneumonia a week later. Zhuo in financial Lang Dan Mr. hard pressed trapped embarrassment among, nasty, decided idea to sell things, for a few francs to live. He first thought is the wife who annoy him fake jewelry, decided to sell her seems to be particularly fond of the string of big necklace, because the fake things work but also sophisticated estimated value may be seven or eight francs. How to get the fake jewelry jewelry store was found to be true valuation, jewelry, londin stunned and shocked. When he took the jewelry to another shop, the shop owner recognized the jewelry as they were sold out in the shop. After the inquiry, check books, this is a really true jewelry. Mr. Lang Dan was so surprised Jane really mad, so go home a few times when the wrong way, finally unexpectedly fainted on the ground. Fortunately, there are passers-by carried him into the pharmacy, sent him home to wake up.
Sad, tired like a hammer blow, make him sleep to second days. He was unable to work again and again, and again, and again into the jewelry store, sold the necklace, and sold his wife's jewelry (almost all this shop sold) to the shop, resigned and told the chief, said he inherited a legacy of three hundred thousand francs, and announced to his colleagues that his plans for the future, and a few prostitutes mixed overnight. Half a year later he remarried, second wife of a woman but bad temper Shukutoku, let him suffer unspeakably.

7. 《莫泊桑短篇小说选》epub下载在线阅读，求百度网盘云资源

《莫泊桑短篇小说集》（[法] 居伊·德·莫泊桑）电子书网盘下载免费在线阅读

资源链接：

链接：https://pan..com/s/1PnIEkVCylhARKJfG4rNguw

书名：莫泊桑短篇小说集

作者：[法] 居伊·德·莫泊桑

译者：庄非

豆瓣评分：8.3

出版社：黑龙江科学技术出版社

出版年份：2018-3-1

内容简介：

《莫泊桑中短篇小说集》为“世界短篇小说之王”、法国著名作家莫泊桑的中短篇小说作品集，为读者呈现出法国当时的社会生活画面，具有深刻的思想内涵和社会价值。通过阅读小说，让读者感受其独特的魅力。莫泊桑的短篇小说所描绘的生活面十分广泛，它们共同构成了19世纪下半期法国社会一幅全面的世俗图。在莫泊桑的小说中，当时社会现实中形形色色的现象无不有形象的描绘；社会各阶层的人物都得到鲜明的勾画；法国城乡的风貌人情也都有生动的写照。而在他广泛的取材面上，有三个突出的重点，即普法战争、巴黎的小职员的生活和法国诺曼底地区的城乡风光与轶事。

作者简介：

莫泊桑，19世纪后半期法国优秀的批判现实主义作家，与契诃夫和欧．亨利并列世界三大短篇小说巨匠，对后世产生极大影响，被誉为“短篇小说之王”。 代表作有《漂亮朋友》、《羊脂球》、《项链》、《我的叔叔于勒》等，由其小说改编的电影风靡全球。

8. 莫泊桑项链对白

The Necklace

She was one of those pretty and charming girls born, as though fate had blundered over her, into a family of artisans. She had no marriage portion, no expectations, no means of getting known, understood, loved, and wedded by a man of wealth and distinction; and she let herself be married off to a little clerk in the Ministry of Ecation. Her tastes were simple because she had never been able to afford any other, but she was as unhappy as though she had married beneath her; for women have no caste or class, their beauty, grace, and charm serving them for birth or family, their natural delicacy, their instinctive elegance, their nimbleness of wit, are their only mark of rank, and put the slum girl on a level with the highest lady in the land.
She suffered endlessly, feeling herself born for every delicacy and luxury. She suffered from the poorness of her house, from its mean walls, worn chairs, and ugly curtains. All these things, of which other women of her class would not even have been aware, tormented and insulted her. The sight of the little Breton girl who came to do the work in her little house aroused heart-broken regrets and hopeless dreams in her mind. She imagined silent antechambers, heavy with Oriental tapestries, lit by torches in lofty bronze sockets, with two tall footmen in knee-breeches sleeping in large arm-chairs, overcome by the heavy warmth of the stove. She imagined vast saloons hung with antique silks, exquisite pieces of furniture supporting priceless ornaments, and small, charming, perfumed rooms, created just for little parties of intimate friends, men who were famous and sought after, whose homage roused every other woman's envious longings.
When she sat down for dinner at the round table covered with a three-days-old cloth, opposite her husband, who took the cover off the soup-tureen, exclaiming delightedly: "Aha! Scotch broth! What could be better?" she imagined delicate meals, gleaming silver, tapestries peopling the walls with folk of a past age and strange birds in faery forests; she imagined delicate food served in marvellous dishes, murmured gallantries, listened to with an inscrutable smile as one trifled with the rosy flesh of trout or wings of asparagus chicken.
She had no clothes, no jewels, nothing. And these were the only things she loved; she felt that she was made for them. She had longed so eagerly to charm, to be desired, to be wildly attractive and sought after.

< 2 >

She had a rich friend, an old school friend whom she refused to visit, because she suffered so keenly when she returned home. She would weep whole days, with grief, regret, despair, and misery.

*

One evening her husband came home with an exultant air, holding a large envelope in his hand.
"Here's something for you," he said.
Swiftly she tore the paper and drew out a printed card on which were these words:
"The Minister of Ecation and Madame Ramponneau request the pleasure of the company of Monsieur and Madame Loisel at the Ministry on the evening of Monday, January the 18th."
Instead of being delighted, as her husband hoped, she flung the invitation petulantly across the table, murmuring:
"What do you want me to do with this?"
"Why, darling, I thought you'd be pleased. You never go out, and this is a great occasion. I had tremendous trouble to get it. Every one wants one; it's very select, and very few go to the clerks. You'll see all the really big people there."
She looked at him out of furious eyes, and said impatiently: "And what do you suppose I am to wear at such an affair?"
He had not thought about it; he stammered:
"Why, the dress you go to the theatre in. It looks very nice, to me . . ."
He stopped, stupefied and utterly at a loss when he saw that his wife was beginning to cry. Two large tears ran slowly down from the corners of her eyes towards the corners of her mouth.
"What's the matter with you? What's the matter with you?" he faltered.
But with a violent effort she overcame her grief and replied in a calm voice, wiping her wet cheeks:
"Nothing. Only I haven't a dress and so I can't go to this party. Give your invitation to some friend of yours whose wife will be turned out better than I shall."
He was heart-broken.
"Look here, Mathilde," he persisted. "What would be the cost of a suitable dress, which you could use on other occasions as well, something very simple?"
She thought for several seconds, reckoning up prices and also wondering for how large a sum she could ask without bringing upon herself an immediate refusal and an exclamation of horror from the careful-minded clerk.

< 3 >

At last she replied with some hesitation:
"I don't know exactly, but I think I could do it on four hundred francs."
He grew slightly pale, for this was exactly the amount he had been saving for a gun, intending to get a little shooting next summer on the plain of Nanterre with some friends who went lark-shooting there on Sundays.
Nevertheless he said: "Very well. I'll give you four hundred francs. But try and get a really nice dress with the money."
The day of the party drew near, and Madame Loisel seemed sad, uneasy and anxious. Her dress was ready, however. One evening her husband said to her:
"What's the matter with you? You've been very odd for the last three days."
"I'm utterly miserable at not having any jewels, not a single stone, to wear," she replied. "I shall look absolutely no one. I would almost rather not go to the party."
"Wear flowers," he said. "They're very smart at this time of the year. For ten francs you could get two or three gorgeous roses."
She was not convinced.
"No . . . there's nothing so humiliating as looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women."
"How stupid you are!" exclaimed her husband. "Go and see Madame Forestier and ask her to lend you some jewels. You know her quite well enough for that."
She uttered a cry of delight.
"That's true. I never thought of it."
Next day she went to see her friend and told her her trouble.
Madame Forestier went to her dressing-table, took up a large box, brought it to Madame Loisel, opened it, and said:
"Choose, my dear."
First she saw some bracelets, then a pearl necklace, then a Venetian cross in gold and gems, of exquisite workmanship. She tried the effect of the jewels before the mirror, hesitating, unable to make up her mind to leave them, to give them up. She kept on asking:
"Haven't you anything else?"
"Yes. Look for yourself. I don't know what you would like best."
Suddenly she discovered, in a black satin case, a superb diamond necklace; her heart began to beat covetously. Her hands trembled as she lifted it. She fastened it round her neck, upon her high dress, and remained in ecstasy at sight of herself.

< 4 >

Then, with hesitation, she asked in anguish:
"Could you lend me this, just this alone?"
"Yes, of course."
She flung herself on her friend's breast, embraced her frenziedly, and went away with her treasure. The day of the party arrived. Madame Loisel was a success. She was the prettiest woman present, elegant, graceful, smiling, and quite above herself with happiness. All the men stared at her, inquired her name, and asked to be introced to her. All the Under-Secretaries of State were eager to waltz with her. The Minister noticed her.
She danced madly, ecstatically, drunk with pleasure, with no thought for anything, in the triumph of her beauty, in the pride of her success, in a cloud of happiness made up of this universal homage and admiration, of the desires she had aroused, of the completeness of a victory so dear to her feminine heart.
She left about four o'clock in the morning. Since midnight her husband had been dozing in a deserted little room, in company with three other men whose wives were having a good time. He threw over her shoulders the garments he had brought for them to go home in, modest everyday clothes, whose poverty clashed with the beauty of the ball-dress. She was conscious of this and was anxious to hurry away, so that she should not be noticed by the other women putting on their costly furs.
Loisel restrained her.
"Wait a little. You'll catch cold in the open. I'm going to fetch a cab."
But she did not listen to him and rapidly descended the staircase. When they were out in the street they could not find a cab; they began to look for one, shouting at the drivers whom they saw passing in the distance.
They walked down towards the Seine, desperate and shivering. At last they found on the quay one of those old nightprowling carriages which are only to be seen in Paris after dark, as though they were ashamed of their shabbiness in the daylight.
It brought them to their door in the Rue des Martyrs, and sadly they walked up to their own apartment. It was the end, for her. As for him, he was thinking that he must be at the office at ten.
She took off the garments in which she had wrapped her shoulders, so as to see herself in all her glory before the mirror. But suddenly she uttered a cry. The necklace was no longer round her neck!

< 5 >

"What's the matter with you?" asked her husband, already half undressed.
She turned towards him in the utmost distress.
"I . . . I . . . I've no longer got Madame Forestier's necklace. . . ."
He started with astonishment.
"What! . . . Impossible!"
They searched in the folds of her dress, in the folds of the coat, in the pockets, everywhere. They could not find it.
"Are you sure that you still had it on when you came away from the ball?" he asked.
"Yes, I touched it in the hall at the Ministry."
"But if you had lost it in the street, we should have heard it fall."
"Yes. Probably we should. Did you take the number of the cab?"
"No. You didn't notice it, did you?"
"No."
They stared at one another, mbfounded. At last Loisel put on his clothes again.
"I'll go over all the ground we walked," he said, "and see if I can't find it."
And he went out. She remained in her evening clothes, lacking strength to get into bed, huddled on a chair, without volition or power of thought.
Her husband returned about seven. He had found nothing.
He went to the police station, to the newspapers, to offer a reward, to the cab companies, everywhere that a ray of hope impelled him.
She waited all day long, in the same state of bewilderment at this fearful catastrophe.
Loisel came home at night, his face lined and pale; he had discovered nothing.
"You must write to your friend," he said, "and tell her that you've broken the clasp of her necklace and are getting it mended. That will give us time to look about us."
She wrote at his dictation.

*

By the end of a week they had lost all hope.
Loisel, who had aged five years, declared:
"We must see about replacing the diamonds."
Next day they took the box which had held the necklace and went to the jewellers whose name was inside. He consulted his books.
"It was not I who sold this necklace, Madame; I must have merely supplied the clasp."
Then they went from jeweller to jeweller, searching for another necklace like the first, consulting their memories, both ill with remorse and anguish of mind.
In a shop at the Palais-Royal they found a string of diamonds which seemed to them exactly like the one they were looking for. It was worth forty thousand francs. They were allowed to have it for thirty-six thousand.

< 6 >

They begged the jeweller not to sell it for three days. And they arranged matters on the understanding that it would be taken back for thirty-four thousand francs, if the first one were found before the end of February.
Loisel possessed eighteen thousand francs left to him by his father. He intended to borrow the rest.
He did borrow it, getting a thousand from one man, five hundred from another, five louis here, three louis there. He gave notes of hand, entered into ruinous agreements, did business with usurers and the whole tribe of money-lenders. He mortgaged the whole remaining years of his existence, risked his signature without even knowing if he could honour it, and, appalled at the agonising face of the future, at the black misery about to fall upon him, at the prospect of every possible physical privation and moral torture, he went to get the new necklace and put down upon the jeweller's counter thirty-six thousand francs.
When Madame Loisel took back the necklace to Madame Forestier, the latter said to her in a chilly voice:
"You ought to have brought it back sooner; I might have needed it."
She did not, as her friend had feared, open the case. If she had noticed the substitution, what would she have thought? What would she have said? Would she not have taken her for a thief?

*

Madame Loisel came to know the ghastly life of abject poverty. From the very first she played her part heroically. This fearful debt must be paid off. She would pay it. The servant was dismissed. They changed their flat; they took a garret under the roof.
She came to know the heavy work of the house, the hateful ties of the kitchen. She washed the plates, wearing out her pink nails on the coarse pottery and the bottoms of pans. She washed the dirty linen, the shirts and dish-cloths, and hung them out to dry on a string; every morning she took the stbin down into the street and carried up the water, stopping on each landing to get her breath. And, clad like a poor woman, she went to the fruiterer, to the grocer, to the butcher, a basket on her arm, haggling, insulted, fighting for every wretched halfpenny of her money.
Every month notes had to be paid off, others renewed, time gained.

< 7 >

Her husband worked in the evenings at putting straight a merchant's accounts, and often at night he did ing at twopence-halfpenny a page.
And this life lasted ten years.
At the end of ten years everything was paid off, everything, the usurer's charges and the accumulation of superimposed interest.
Madame Loisel looked old now. She had become like all the other strong, hard, coarse women of poor households. Her hair was badly done, her skirts were awry, her hands were red. She spoke in a shrill voice, and the water slopped all over the floor when she scrubbed it. But sometimes, when her husband was at the office, she sat down by the window and thought of that evening long ago, of the ball at which she had been so beautiful and so much admired.
What would have happened if she had never lost those jewels. Who knows? Who knows? How strange life is, how fickle! How little is needed to ruin or to save!
One Sunday, as she had gone for a walk along the Champs-Elysees to freshen herself after the labours of the week, she caught sight suddenly of a woman who was taking a child out for a walk. It was Madame Forestier, still young, still beautiful, still attractive.
Madame Loisel was conscious of some emotion. Should she speak to her? Yes, certainly. And now that she had paid, she would tell her all. Why not?
She went up to her.
"Good morning, Jeanne."
The other did not recognise her, and was surprised at being thus familiarly addressed by a poor woman.
"But . . . Madame . . ." she stammered. "I don't know . . . you must be making a mistake."
"No . . . I am Mathilde Loisel."
Her friend uttered a cry.
"Oh! . . . my poor Mathilde, how you have changed! . . ."
"Yes, I've had some hard times since I saw you last; and many sorrows . . . and all on your account."
"On my account! . . . How was that?"
"You remember the diamond necklace you lent me for the ball at the Ministry?"
"Yes. Well?"
"Well, I lost it."
"How could you? Why, you brought it back."
"I brought you another one just like it. And for the last ten years we have been paying for it. You realise it wasn't easy for us; we had no money. . . . Well, it's paid for at last, and I'm glad indeed."

< 8 >

Madame Forestier had halted.
"You say you bought a diamond necklace to replace mine?"
"Yes. You hadn't noticed it? They were very much alike."
And she smiled in proud and innocent happiness.
Madame Forestier, deeply moved, took her two hands.
"Oh, my poor Mathilde! But mine was imitation. It was worth at the very most five hundred francs! . . . "