The princess exchanged a rapid glance with D'Aigrigny, and answered: "Oh, let me see! Yes, I was there about a week ago."
"You will find great changes then. The wall that was next to my asylum has been taken down, for they are going to build anew wing and a chapel, the old one being too small. I must say in praise of Mdlle. Adrienne" continued the doctor with a singular smile aside, "that she promised me a copy of one of Raphael's Madonnas for this chapel."
"Really? very appropriate!" said the princess. "But here it is almost noon, and M. Tripeaud has not come."
"He is the deputy-guardian of Mdlle. de Cardoville, whose property he has managed, as former agent of the count-duke," said the marquis, with evident anxiety, "and his presence here is absolutely indispensable. It is greatly to be desired that his coming should precede that of Mdlle. de Cardoville, who may be here at any moment."
"It is unlucky that his portrait will not do as well," said the doctor, smiling maliciously, and drawing a small pamphlet from his pocket.
"What is that, doctor?" asked the princess.
"One of those anonymous sheets, which are published from time to time. It is called the 'Scourge,' and Baron Tripeaud's portrait is drawn with such faithfulness, that it ceases to be satire. It is really quite life like; you have only to listen. The sketch is entitled: 'TYPE OF THE LYNX SPECIES.'
"'The Baron Tripeaud.—This man, who is as basely humble towards his social superiors, as he is insolent and coarse to those who depend upon him—is the living, frightful incarnation of the worst pardon of the moneyed and commercial aristocracy—one of the rich and cynical speculators, without heart, faith or conscience, who would speculate for a rise or fall on the death of his mother, if the death of his mother could influence the price of stocks.
"'Such persons have all the odious vices of men suddenly elevated, not like those whom honest and patient labor has nobly enriched, but like those who owe their wealth to some blind caprice of fortune, or some lucky cast of the net in the miry waters of stock-jobbing.
"'Once up in the world, they hate the people—because the people remind them of a mushroom origin of which they are ashamed. Without pity for the dreadful misery of the masses, they ascribe it wholly to idleness or debauchery because this calumny forms an excuse for their barbarous selfishness.