Everything in the drawing-room pointed to the breaking up of the household. Underlinen, dresses, petticoats were scattered all over the furniture. The writing-table was littered with a pile of stockings, a short time ago the delight of my eyes, to-day an abomination. She came and went, counted and folded up, brazenly, shamelessly.
"Had I corrupted her in so short a time?" I asked myself, gazing at this exhibition of a respectable woman's underclothing.
She examined one piece after another, and put on one side everything which needed repairing; she noticed that on one garment the tapes were missing; she laid it aside with perfect unconcern.
I seemed to be present at an execution; I felt sick with misery, while she listened absent-mindedly to my futile conversation about unimportant details. I was waiting for the Baron, who had locked himself into the dining-room and was writing letters.
At last the door opened; I started apprehensively, but it was only the little girl who came in, puzzled to know the reason of all this upset. She ran up to me, accompanied by her mother's spaniel, and held up her forehead to be kissed. I blushed. I felt angry, and turned to the Baroness.
"You might at least have spared me this!"
But she did not understand what I meant.
"Mamma is going away, darling, but she'll soon be back and bring you lots of toys."
The little dog begged for a caress—he, too!
A little later the Baron appeared.