The toilette of Mad. de Coulanges, this morning, went on at the usual rate. Whether in adversity or prosperity, this was to la comtesse an elaborate, but never a tedious work. Long as it had lasted, it was, however, finished; and she had full leisure for a fit and a half of the vapours, before Mrs. Somers returned—she came in with a face radiant with joy.
“Fortunately, most fortunately,” cried she, “I have it in my power to repair the loss occasioned by the failure of this good-for-nothing banker! Nay, positively, Mad. de Coulanges, I must not be refused,” continued she, in a peremptory manner. “You make an enemy, if you refuse a friend.”
She laid a pocket-book on the table, and left the room instantly. The pocket-book contained notes to a very considerable amount, surpassing the sum which Mad. de Coulanges had lost by her banker; and on a scrap of paper was written in pencil “Mad. de Coulanges must never return this sum, for it is utterly useless to Mrs. Somers; as the superfluities it was appropriated to purchase are now in the possession of one who will not sell them.”
Astonished equally at the magnitude and the manner of the gift, Mad. de Coulanges repeated, a million of times, that it was “noble! très noble! une belle action!”—that she could not possibly accept of such an obligation—that she could not tell how to refuse it—that Mrs. Somers was the most generous woman upon earth—that Mrs. Somers had thrown her into a terrible embarrassment.
Then la comtesse had recourse to her smelling-bottle, consulted Emilie’s eyes, and answered them.
“Child! I have no thoughts of accepting; but I only ask you how I can refuse, after what has been said, without making Mrs. Somers my enemy? You see her humour—English humours must not be trifled with—her humour, you see, is to give. It is a shocking thing for people of our birth to be reduced to receive, but we cannot avoid it without losing Mrs. Somers’ friendship entirely; and that is what you would not wish to do, Emilie.”
“Oh, no, indeed!”
“Now we must be under obligations to our milliner and jeweller, if we do not pay them immediately; for these sort of people call it a favour to give credit for a length of time: and I really think that it is much better to be indebted to Mrs. Somers than to absolute strangers and to rude tradespeople. It is always best to have to deal with polite persons.”
“And with generous persons!” cried Emilie; “and a more generous person than Mrs. Somers, I am sure, cannot exist.”
“And then,” continued Mad. de Coulanges, “like all these rich English, she can afford to be generous. I am persuaded that this Mrs. Somers is as rich as a Russian princess; yes, as rich as the Russian princess with the superb diadem of diamonds. You remember her at Paris?”