"So be it, madame. It affords just as good a topic of conversation as any other, and you excel in this kind of discourse, I believe."
"M. de Maillefort will oblige me by reserving his insulting irony for some other occasion," retorted Madame de Senneterre, haughtily. "He would also do well to remember that he has the honour of speaking to the Duchesse de Senneterre."
"Madame la Duchesse de Senneterre will do me the honour to treat me with the consideration due me," replied the hunchback, sternly; "if not, I shall govern my words exactly by Madame de Senneterre's."
"Is that intended as a threat, monsieur?"
"As a lesson, madame."
"A lesson, to me?"
"And why not, may I ask? What, I who was your husband's oldest and most trusted friend, I who love Gerald as a son, I who have a right to the respect and esteem of every one,—do you understand, madame? to the respect of every one,—I whose birth is at least equal to yours (it is well to remind you of that, as you attach such an absurd importance to such trifles), I am to be greeted with insulting words and eyes flashing with anger; and yet I am not to remind you of what you owe to me and what you owe to yourself?"
Like all vain and arrogant persons who are not accustomed to the slightest contradiction, Madame de Senneterre was at first surprised and irritated, but afterwards, awed by this stern and sensible language, her anger giving place to a profound despondency, she replied:
"Ah, monsieur, you should at least make some allowance for the despair a mother naturally feels on seeing her son ruined for ever."
"Ruined?"