“It's useless to play modest,” she smiled. “With your pretty face, it makes sense that girls would run after you.”

She let out a deep sigh.

“What a shame you're not older. Otherwise, I assure you that I wouldn't have married your brother.”

Demonstrating an impudence that seemed monstrous to me, she added:

“Yes, with you I would have been happy. I'm certain that you would have known how to make love to me. While that poor Harry…”

She shrugged her shoulders disdainfully.

“Granted, he's very nice to me. He doesn't refuse me anything. But he's such an incapable lover! I guess if I hadn't known pleasure, perhaps I would be content with his clumsy embraces. But before my marriage, I must admit that I received an excellent education…”

It was her Uncle Armand who had given her this education. Her parents had been forced to go to South America for several weeks and Jackie was to stay with her father's brother who lived in a luxurious apartment in Neuilly.

Despite his forty-five years, Armand was a devoted lover.

His svelte appearance, his slightly graying temples, his rapacious expression permitted his great success.

“My child,” he soon said to Jackie, “my worldly obligations force me to go out in the evenings quite often. Since I was afraid you might get bored or not want to be left alone, I have asked a young person who sometimes works as my secretary to watch you.”

With her fawn-colored hair and roguish expression, Margie was one of those girls whom every man feels constrained to proposition.

She and Jackie sympathized with one another. They slept in the same room and shared the same bed.

For a few days, their relations were simply friendly. They had the same playful nature. They understood each other marvelously. At night, they slept side by side, like innocent children.

Having had a great number of affairs, some of which were lesbian, Margie was burning with impatience beside the body that had the attraction of forbidden fruit to her.