The two enemies looked at each other…

The two enemies looked at each other silently. Each of them seemed to be waiting for the other one to provoke him. From the muted rage spread over Brousselle’s face, one could have thought for a moment that some deadly insult was about to shoot from his tense white lips. This didn’t happen, though. After a violent but short inner struggle, Laure’s stepfather managed to hold back his fury. He soon smiled proudly, as a man who was able to triumph over himself and thus believes that he has the right to count for nothing any other enemy, and withdrawing with a calm and slow movement, he sat back in a corner of the carriage, with a scornful look on his face.
This arrogant pantomime enraged Laubespin more than a direct insult might have done, and it made him lose the calm he had wanted to keep.
– Sir, just one word, he said in a heated voice, while leading his horse near the door of the carriage.
– I am listening, sir, Brousselle replied casually without moving.
– This meeting in front of the house where I live suggests that perhaps you intended to visit me.
– Now you’re telling me something new. Until this moment, I had no idea that you lived in this house.
– And yet, the way you parked in front of the door suggests …
– That I’m expecting someone, this is quite possible, but that someone is not you.
 
Extract from Un beau-père (A stepfather), by C. de Bernard, published in Les Bons Romans, 1862.