This speech brought a flush to the cheeks of the impassible Camille.
Again Madame du Guenic sat up till one o’clock that night, waiting for her son, unable to imagine why he should stay so late if Mademoiselle des Touches did not love him.
“He must be in their way,” said this adorable mother. “What were you talking about?” she asked, when at last he came in.
“Oh, mother, I have never before spent such a delightful evening. Genius is a great, a sublime thing! Why didn’t you give me genius? With genius we can make our lives, we can choose among all women the woman to love, and she must be ours.”
“How handsome you are, my Calyste!”
“Claude Vignon is handsome. Men of genius have luminous foreheads and eyes, through which the lightnings flash—but I, alas! I know nothing—only to love.”
“They say that suffices, my angel,” she said, kissing him on the forehead.
“Do you believe it?”
“They say so, but I have never known it.”
Calyste kissed his mother’s hand as if it was a sacred thing.