“Exquisite,” answered the young man, and this time, again, Newman suspected him of irony.
His sister-in-law came round to the other side of the fire with her cup of tea in her hand, holding it out at arm’s-length, so that she might not spill it on her dress, and uttering little cries of alarm. She placed the cup on the mantel-shelf and begun to unpin her veil and pull off her gloves, looking meanwhile at Newman.
“Is there anything I can do for you, my dear lady?” the Count Valentin asked, in a sort of mock-caressing tone.
“Present monsieur,” said his sister-in-law.
The young man answered, “Mr. Newman!”
“I can’t courtesy to you, monsieur, or I shall spill my tea,” said the lady. “So Claire receives strangers, like that?” she added, in a low voice, in French, to her brother-in-law.
“Apparently!” he answered with a smile. Newman stood a moment, and then he approached Madame de Cintré. She looked up at him as if she were thinking of something to say. But she seemed to think of nothing; so she simply smiled. He sat down near her and she handed him a cup of tea. For a few moments they talked about that, and meanwhile he looked at her. He remembered what Mrs. Tristram had told him of her “perfection” and of her having, in combination, all the brilliant things that he dreamed of finding. This made him observe her not only without mistrust, but without uneasy conjectures; the presumption, from the first moment he looked at her, had been in her favor. And yet, if she was beautiful, it was not a dazzling beauty. She was tall and moulded in long lines; she had thick fair hair, a wide forehead, and features with a sort of harmonious irregularity. Her clear gray eyes were strikingly expressive; they were both gentle and intelligent, and Newman liked them immensely; but they had not those depths of splendor—those many-colored rays—which illumine the brows of famous beauties. Madame de Cintré was rather thin, and she looked younger than probably she was. In her whole person there was something both youthful and subdued, slender and yet ample, tranquil yet shy; a mixture of immaturity and repose, of innocence and dignity. What had Tristram meant, Newman wondered, by calling her proud? She was certainly not proud now, to him; or if she was, it was of no use, it was lost upon him; she must pile it up higher if she expected him to mind it. She was a beautiful woman, and it was very easy to get on with her. Was she a countess, a marquise, a kind of historical formation? Newman, who had rarely heard these words used, had never been at pains to attach any particular image to them; but they occurred to him now and seemed charged with a sort of melodious meaning. They signified something fair and softly bright, that had easy motions and spoke very agreeably.
“Have you many friends in Paris; do you go out?” asked Madame de Cintré, who had at last thought of something to say.
“Do you mean do I dance, and all that?”
“Do you go dans le monde, as we say?”