Clemence raised her eyes to her aunt’s face as if to demand an explanation.
It was such a calm, steady glance that the latter could not help being impressed by it.
“Well,” said she, softening her voice, “there is no necessity for putting on such queenly airs; we are here alone, and you know that I am a kind aunt to you. Now, then, speak freely—have you left anything or any person in Paris, the remembrance of which makes your sojourn here more tiresome than it really is? Any of your adorers of the winter?”
“What an idea, aunt! Did I have any adorers?” exclaimed Madame de Bergenheim, quickly, as if trying to conceal by a smile the rosy flush that mounted to her cheeks.
“And what if you should have some, child?” continued the old maid, to whom curiosity lent an unaccustomed coaxing accent to her voice, “where would be the harm? Is it forbidden to please? When one is of good birth, must one not live in society and hold one’s position there? One need not bury one’s self in a desert at twenty-three years of age, and you really are charming enough to inspire love; you understand, I do not say, to experience it; but when one is young and pretty conquests are made almost unwittingly. You are not the first of the family to whom that has happened; you are a Corandeuil. Now, then, my good Clemence, what troubled heart is pining for you in Paris? Is it Monsieur de Mauleon?”
“Monsieur de Mauleon!” exclaimed the young woman, bursting into laughter; “he, a heart! and a troubled one, too! Oh, aunt, you do him honor! Monsieur de Mauleon, who is past forty-five years old and wears stays! an audacious man who squeezes his partners’ hands in the dance and looks at them with passionate glances! Oh! Monsieur de Mauleon!”
Mademoiselle de Corandeuil sanctioned by a slight grimace of her thin lips her niece’s burst of gayety, when, with one hand upon her heart, she rolled her sparkling eyes in imitation of the languishing air of her unfortunate adorer.
“Perhaps it is Monsieur d’Arzenac?”
“Monsieur d’Arzenac is certainly very nice; he has perfect manners; it may be that he did not disdain to chat with me; on my side, I found his conversation very entertaining; but you may rest assured that he did not think of me nor I of him. Besides, you know that he is engaged to marry Mademoiselle de la Neuville.”
“Monsieur de Gerfaut?” continued Mademoiselle de Corandeuil, with the persistency with which aged people follow an idea, and as if determined to pass in review all the young men of their acquaintance until she had discovered her niece’s secret.