CHAPTER VI.
Notwithstanding the triteness of the mythological comparison, we must be pardoned for saying that never Hebe, the cupbearer to the gods of Olympus, in all the brilliancy of her superhuman beauty, united in herself more resplendent charms than did, in her terrestrial loveliness, the modest maiden, Antonine Hubert, whose love secret with Frantz M. Pascal had surprised.
What seemed most attractive in this young girl was the beauty of fifteen years and a half which combined the grace and freshness of the child with the budding charms of young womanhood,—enchanting age, still full of mysteries and chaste ignorances, a pure dawn, white and transparent, that the first palpitations of an innocent love would colour with the exquisite tint of the full-blown rose.
Such was the age of Antonine, and she had the charm and all the charms of that age.
To humanise our Hebe, we will make her descend from her pedestal, and, veiling her delicate and beautiful form, will clothe her in an elegant summer robe; a black silk mantle will hide the exquisite contour of her bust, and a straw hat, lined with silk as rosy as her cheeks, allowing us a view of her chestnut tresses, will serve as a frame for the oval face, as fresh, as fair, and as soft as that of the child she has just embraced.
As she entered the parlour with Sophie, mademoiselle blushed slightly, for she had the timidity of her fifteen years; then, put at ease by the cordial reception of Dutertre and his wife, she said to the latter, with a sort of deference drawn from their old relations of child and mother, as they were called in the boarding-school where they had been brought up together:
"You do not know the good fortune which brings me here, Sophie."
"A good fortune!—so much the better, my little Antonine!"
"A letter from St. Madeleine," replied the young girl, drawing an envelope from her pocket.
"Really!" exclaimed Sophie, blushing with joy and surprise, as she reached her hand impatiently for the letter.