“Oh! mon Dieu! is it possible to say, when one is so young? One always imagines that one is in love, but one does not even know what love is. You must have been very much surprised to learn that I was no longer living with Monsieur de Brévanne?”
“Yes, madame; and yet such things happen rather often.”
“Look you, Armand, I am sorry that I didn’t marry you; we should never have parted.”
Monsieur de Merval shook his head slightly and answered with a smile:
“No one knows, no one knows!”
Madame de Grangeville blushed, then assumed a serious air.
“You may perhaps believe all the slanders that Monsieur de Brévanne no doubt spread about me?”
“I knew nothing, heard nothing, madame. Monsieur de Brévanne is too well-bred a man to say anything which could possibly injure your reputation.”
“Oh! when a man is jealous, monsieur, when he fancies himself betrayed, he is sometimes so absurd!”
Monsieur de Merval made no reply, but continued to look about the salon, and seemed painfully affected by the lack of harmony in the furniture.