Reduced by despair to make almost any attempt, and fascinated, in spite of himself, by the diabolical hints of Faringhea, Djalma looked for a second full at Mdlle. de Cardoville; then, with a trembling hand he took the bouquet from Rose-Pompon, and, again looking at Adrienne, pressed it to his lips.
Upon this insolent bravado, Mdlle. de Cardoville could not restrain so sudden and visible a pang, that the prince was struck by it.
“She is yours,” said the half-caste, to him. “Did you see, my lord, how she trembled with jealousy?—Only have courage! and she is yours. She will soon prefer you to that handsome young man behind her—for it is he whom she has hitherto fancied herself in love with.”
As if the half-caste had guessed the movement of rage and hatred, which this revelation would excite in the heart of the prince, he hastily added: “Calmness and disdain! Is it not his turn now to hate you?”
The prince restrained himself, and drew his hand across his forehead which glowed with anger.
“There now! what are you telling him, that vexes him so?” said Rose Pompon to Faringhea, with pouting lip. Then, addressing Djalma, she continued: “Come, Prince Charming, as they say in the fairy-tale, give me back my flowers.”
As she took it again, she added: “You have kissed it, and I could almost eat it.” Then, with a sigh, and a passionate glance at Djalma, she said softly to herself: “That monster Ninny Moulin did not deceive me. All this is quite proper; I have not even that to reproach myself with.” And with her little white teeth, she bit at a rosy nail of her right hand, from which she had just drawn the glove.
It is hardly necessary to say, that Adrienne’s letter had not been delivered to the prince, and that he had not gone to pass the day in the country with Marshal Simon. During the three days in which Montbron had not seen Djalma, Faringhea had persuaded him, that, by affecting another passion, he would bring Mdlle. de Cardoville to terms. With regard to Djalma’s presence at the theatre, Rodin had learned from her maid, Florine, that her mistress was to go in the evening to the Porte-Saint Martin. Before Djalma had recognized her, Adrienne, who felt her strength failing her, was on the point of quitting the theatre; the man, whom she had hitherto placed so high, whom she had regarded as a hero and a demi-god and whom she had imagined plunged in such dreadful despair, that, led by the most tender pity, she had written to him with simple frankness, that a sweet hope might calm his grief—replied to a generous mark of sincerity and love, by making himself a ridiculous spectacle with a creature unworthy of him. What incurable wounds for Adrienne’s pride! It mattered little, whether Djalma knew or not, that she would be a spectator of the indignity. But when she saw herself recognized by the prince, when he carried the insult so far as to look full at her, and, at the same time, raise to his lips the creature’s bouquet who accompanied him, Adrienne was seized with noble indignation, and felt sufficient courage to remain: instead of closing her eyes to evidence, she found a sort of barbarous pleasure in assisting at the agony and death of her pure and divine love. With head erect, proud and flashing eye, flushed cheek, and curling lip, she looked in her turn at the prince with disdainful steadiness. It was with a sardonic smile that she said to the marchioness, who, like many others of the spectators was occupied with what was passing in the stage-box: “This revolting exhibition of savage manners is at least in accordance with the rest of the performance.”
“Certainly,” said the marchioness; “and my dear uncle will have lost, perhaps, the most amusing part.”
“Montbron?” said Adrienne, hastily, with hardly repressed bitterness; “yes, he will regret not having seen all. I am impatient for his arrival. Is it not to him that I am indebted for his charming evening?”