“Madame la Comtesse, you have doubtless not forgotten that we have business together; even if you have a short memory, I never forget what has pleased me. I shall have the honor to wait for you where my messenger will conduct you, if you please to come.”
Jeanne, although rather vexed2, immediately reentered the coach, and told the footman to get on the box with the coachman. Ten minutes sufficed to bring her to the entrance of the Faubourg St. Antoine, where, in a hollow and completely hidden by great trees, was one of those pretty houses built in the time of Louis XV., with all the taste of the sixteenth, with the comfort of the eighteenth, century.
“Oh, oh! a petite maison!” said she to herself. “It is very natural on the part of M. de Rohan, but very humiliating for Valois. But, patience.”
She was led from room to room till she came to a small dining-room, fitted up with exquisite4 taste. There she found the cardinal waiting for her. He was looking over some pamphlets, but rose immediately on seeing her.
“Ah, here you are. Thanks, Madame la Comtesse,” and he approached to kiss her hand; but she drew back with a reproachful and indignant air.
“What is the matter, madame?” he asked.
“You are, doubtless, not accustomed, monseigneur, to receive such a greeting from the women whom your eminence5 is in the habit of summoning here.”
“Oh! madame.”
“We are in your petite maison, are we not, sir?” continued she, looking disdainfully around her.
“But, madame——”
“I had hoped that your eminence would have deigned7 to remember in what rank I was born. I had hoped that you would have been pleased to consider, that if God has made me poor, He has at least left me the pride of my race.”
“Come, come, countess, I took you for a woman of intellect.”
“You call a woman of intellect, it appears, monseigneur, every one who is indifferent to, and laughs at, everything, even dishonor. To these women, pardon me, your eminence, I have been in the habit of giving a different name.”
“No, countess, you deceive yourself; I call a woman of intellect one who listens when you speak to her, and does not speak before having listened.”
“I listen, then.”
“I had to speak to you of serious matters, countess.”
“Therefore you receive me in a dining-room.”
“Why, would you have preferred my receiving you in a boudoir?”
“The distinction is nice,” said she.
“I think so, countess.”
“Then I am simply to sup with you?”
“Nothing else.”
“I trust your eminence is persuaded that I feel the honor as I ought.”
“You are quizzing, countess.”
“No, I only laugh; would you rather I were angry? You are difficult to please, monseigneur.”
“Oh; you are charming when you laugh, and I ask nothing better than to see you always doing so; but at this moment you are not laughing; oh, no! there is anger in that smile which shows your beautiful teeth.”
“Not the least in the world, monseigneur.”
“That is good.”
“And I hope you will sup well.”
“I shall sup well, and you?”
“Oh, I am not hungry.”
“How, madame, you refuse to sup with me—you send me away?”
“I do not understand you, monseigneur.”
“Listen, dear countess; if you were less in a passion, I would tell you that it is useless to behave like this—you are always equally charming; but as at each compliment I fear to be dismissed, I abstain8.”
“You fear to be dismissed? Really, I beg pardon of your eminence, but you become unintelligible9.”
“It is, however, quite clear, what I say. The other day, when I came to see you, you complained that you were lodged10 unsuitably to your rank. I thought, therefore, that to restore you to your proper place would be like restoring air to the bird whom the experimenter has placed under his air-pump. Consequently, beautiful countess, that you might receive me with pleasure, and that I, on my part, might visit you without compromising either you or myself——” He stopped and looked at her.
“Well!” she said.
“I hoped that you would deign6 to accept this small residence; you observe, I do not call it ‘petite maison.’”
“Accept! you give me this house, monseigneur?” said Jeanne, her heart beating with eagerness.
“A very small gift, countess; but if I had offered you more, you would have refused.”
“Oh, monseigneur, it is impossible for me to accept this.”
“Impossible, why? Do not say that word to me, for I do not believe in it. The house belongs to you, the keys are here on this silver plate; do you find out another humiliation11 in this?”
“No, but——”
“Then accept.”
“Monseigneur, I have told you.”
“How, madame? you write to the ministers for a pension, you accept a hundred louis from an unknown lady——”
“Oh, monseigneur, it is different.”
“Come, I have waited for you in your dining-room. I have not yet seen the boudoir, nor the drawing-room, nor the bedrooms, for I suppose there are all these.”
“Oh, monseigneur, forgive me; you force me to confess that you the most delicate of men,” and she blushed with the pleasure she had been so long restraining. But checking herself, she sat down and said, “Now, will your eminence give me my supper?”
The cardinal took off his cloak, and sat down also.
Supper was served in a few moments. Jeanne put on her mask before the servants came in.
“It is I who ought to wear a mask,” said the cardinal, “for you are at home, among your own people.”
Jeanne laughed, but did not take hers off. In spite of her pleasure and surprise, she made a good supper. The cardinal was a man of much talent, and from his great knowledge of the world and of women, he was a man difficult to contend with, and he thought that this country girl, full of pretension12, but who, in spite of her pride, could not conceal13 her greediness, would be an easy conquest, worth undertaking14 on account of her beauty, and of a something piquant15 about her, very pleasing to a man “blasé” like him. He therefore never took pains to be much on his guard with her; and she, more cunning than he thought, saw through his opinion of her, and tried to strengthen it by playing the provincial16 coquette, and appearing silly, that her adversary17 might be in reality weak in his over-confidence.
The cardinal thought her completely dazzled by the present he had made her—and so, indeed, she was; but he forgot that he himself was below the mark of the ambition of a woman like Jeanne.
“Come,” said he, pouring out for her a glass of cyprus wine, “as you have signed your contract with me, you will not be unfriendly any more, countess.”
“Oh no!”
“You will receive me here sometimes without repugnance18?”
“I shall never be so ungrateful as to forget whose house this really is.”
“Not mine.”
“Oh yes, monseigneur.”
“Do not contradict me, I advise you, or I shall begin to impose conditions.”
“You take care on your part——”
“Of what?”
“Why, I am at home here, you know, and if your conditions are unreasonable19, I shall call my servants——”
The cardinal laughed.
“Ah, you laugh, sir; you think if I call they will not come.”
“Oh, you quite mistake, countess. I am nothing here, only your guest. Apropos,” continued he, as if it had just entered his head, “have you heard anything more of the ladies who came to see you?”
“The ladies of the portrait?” said Jeanne, who, now knowing the queen, saw through the artifice20.
“Yes, the ladies of the portrait.”
“Monseigneur, you know them as well and even better than I do, I feel sure.”
“Oh, countess, you do me wrong. Did you not express a wish to learn who they were?”
“Certainly; it is natural to desire to know your benefactors21.”
“Well, if knew, I should have told you.”
“M. le Cardinal, you do know them.”
“No.”
“If you repeat that ‘no,’ I shall have to call you a liar
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CHAPTER XX. GOLD.
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CHAPTER XXII. SOME WORDS ABOUT THE OPERA.
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