"No, dear duchesse, I fear I have not even looked for him—the science of patches I have always found so much harder than the science of living!" gayly answered Madame de Sévigné.
Madame de Kerman had now re joined them, and all three passed into la
Chambre des Marmousets.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE AFTER-DINNER TALK OF THREE GREAT LADIES.
The three ladies grouped themselves about the fire, which they found already lighted. The duchesse chose a Henry II. carved aim chair, one, she laughingly remarked, quite large enough to have held both the King and Diana. A lackey carrying the inevitable muff-dogs, their fans, and scent-bottles, had followed the ladies; he placed a hassock at the duchesse's feet, two beneath the slender feet of Madame de Kerman, and, after having been bidden to open one of the casements, since it was still so light without, withdrew, leaving the ladies alone.
Although Madame de Sévigné had comfortably ensconced herself in one of the deep window seats, piling the cushions behind her, no sooner was the window opened than with characteristic impetuosity she jumped up to look out into the country that lay beyond the leaded glass. In spite of the long day's drive in the open air, her appetite for blowing roses and sweet earth smells had not been sated. Madame de Sévigné all her life had been the victim of two loves and a passion; she adored society and she loved nature; these were her lesser delights, that gave way before the chief idolatry of her soul, her adoration for her daughter.
[Illustration: MADAME DE SÉVIGNÉ]
As she stood by the open window, her charming face, always a mirror of her emotions, was suffused with a glow and a bloom that made it seem young again. Her eyes grew to twice their common size under the "wandering" eyelids, as her gaze roved over the meadows and across the tall grasses to the sea. A part of her youth was being, indeed, vividly brought back to her; the sight of this marine landscape recalled many memories; and with the recollection her whole face and figure seemed to irradiate something of the inward ardor that consumed her. She had passed this very road, through this same country before, long ago, in her youth, with her children. She half smiled at the remembrance of a description given of the impression produced by her appearance on the journey by her friend the Abbé Arnauld; he had ecstatically compared her to Latona seated in an open coach, between a youthful Apollo and a young Diana. In spite of the abbe's poetical extravagance, Madame de Sévigné recognized, in this moment of retrospect, the truth of the picture. That, indeed, had been a radiant moment! Her life at that time had been so full, and the rapture so complete—the rapture of possessing her children—that she could remember to have had the sense of fairly evaporating happiness. And now, the sigh came, how scattered was this gay group! her son in Brittany, her daughter in Provence, two hundred leagues away! And she, an elderly Latona, mourning her Apollo and her divine huntress, her incomparable Diana.
The inextinguishable name of youth was burning still, however, in Madame de Sévigné's rich nature. This adventure, this amazing adventure of three ladies of the court having to pass the night in a rude little Normandy inn, she, for one, was finding richly seasoned with the spice of the unforeseen; it would be something to talk of and write about for a month hence at Chaulnes and at Paris. Their entire journey, in point of fact, had been a series of the most delightful episodes. It was now nearly a month since they had started from Picardy, from the castle of Chaulnes, going into Normandy via Rouen. They had been on a driving tour, their destination being Rennes, which they would reach in a week or so. They had been travelling in great state, with the very best coach, the very best horses; and they had been guarded by a whole regiment of cavaliers and halberdiers. Every possible precaution had been taken \against their being disagreeably surprised on their route. Their chief fear on the journey had been, of course, the cry common in their day of "Au voleur!" and the meeting of brigands and assassins; for, once outside of Paris and the police reforms of that dear Colbert, and one must be prepared to take one's life in one's hand. Happily, no such misadventures had befallen them. The roads, it is true, they had found for the most part in a horrible condition; they had been pitched about from one end of their coach to the other they might easily have imagined themselves at sea. The dust also had nearly blinded them, in spite of their masks. The other nuisances most difficult to put up with had been the swarm of beggars that infested the roadsides; and worst of all had been the army of crippled, deformed, and mangy soldiers. These latter they had encountered everywhere; their whines and cries, their armless, legless bodies, their hideous filth, and their insolent importunities, they had found a veritable pest.
Another annoyance had been the over-zealous courtesy of some of the upper middle-class. Only yesterday, in the very midst of the dust and under the burning noon sun, they had all been forced to alight, to receive the homage tendered the duchesse, of some thirty women and as many men. Each one of the sixty must, of course, kiss the duchesse's hand. It was really an outrage to have exposed them to such a form of torture! Poor Madame de Kerman, the delicate one of the party, had entirely collapsed after the ceremony. The duchesse also had been prostrated; it had wearied her more than all the rest of the journey. Madame de Sévigné alone had not suffered. She was possessed of a degree of physical fortitude which made her equal to any demand. The other two ladies, as well as she herself, were now experiencing the pleasant exhilaration which comes with the hour of rest after an excellent dinner. They were in a condition to remember nothing except the agreeable. Madame de Sévigné was the first to break the silence.