“But Clémentine—”
“Don’t talk to me of Clémentine.” I was startled by the sudden note of sharp personal grievance in her voice. “Her conduct is scandalous. Her mother was my first cousin and dearest friend. It is fortunate that she is dead. How could she be blamed for that marriage, yet Clémentine always blamed her and set to work deliberately to make her suffer.”
“I know nothing of Clémentine’s marriage.”
“Well, her husband—but no matter, there is no excuse for her making herself an object of derision.”
“I scarcely think she does that, dear, she is in great demand you know, in the very highest quarters.”
“At foreign courts, perhaps, not in her own country. If it weren’t for the obligations of kinship no one, but no one would speak to her.”
“Just what is it that she has done that you so disapprove of?”
“She has made herself cheap. She has vulgarized her position, she plays at being a bohemian, she has bartered away her dignity for a little sordid amusement.”
“And I?”
“You are in danger of doing the same, but in greater danger.”