“You see, Monsieur et Madame with their own staircases, their own passages, their own doors in and out, and all separate for the people of Monsieur, and the women of Madame, and here through this little door you go into the apartments of Madame.”
Ormond’s English foot stopped respectfully.
“Eh, entrez toujours,” said Mademoiselle, as the husband had said before at the door of the boudoir.
“But Madame de Connal is dressing, perhaps,” said Ormond.
“Et puis?—and what then? you must get rid as fast as you can of your English préjugés—and she is not here neither,” said Mademoiselle, opening the door.
Madame de Connal was in an inner apartment; and Ormond, the instant after he entered this room with Mademoiselle, heard a quick step, which he knew was Dora’s, running to bolt the door of the inner room—he was glad that she had not quite got rid of her English prejudices.
Mdlle. O’Faley pointed out to him all the accommodations of a French apartment: she had not at this moment the slightest malice or bad intention in any thing she was saying—she simply spoke in all the innocence of a Frenchwoman—if that term be intelligible. If she had any secret motive, it was merely the vanity of showing that she was quite Parisienne; and there again she was mistaken; for having lived half her life out of Paris, she had forgotten, if she ever had it, the tone of good society, and upon her return had overdone the matter, exaggerated French manners, to prove to her niece that she knew les usages, les convenances, les nuances—enfin, la mode de Paris! A more dangerous guide in Paris for a young married woman in every respect could scarcely be found.
M. de Connal’s valet now came to let Mr. Ormond know that Monsieur waited his orders. But for this interruption, he was in a fair way to hear all the private history of the family, all the secrets that Mademoiselle knew.
Of the amazing communicativeness of Frenchwomen on all subjects, our young hero had as yet no conception.