“You surely do not expect to be admitted into a convent?”
“Heaven forbid!” cried Félise.
“Heaven would forbid,” said Madame Robineau severely, “seeing that you have not the vocation. But the jeune fille bien élevée”—in the mouth of her Aunt Clothilde the familiar phrase assumed a detestable significance, implying, to Félise’s mind, a pallid young creature from whom all blood and laughter had been driven by undesirable virtues—“the jeune fille bien élevée has only two careers offered to her—the convent or marriage. For you, my dear child, it is marriage.”
“Well,” said Félise, with a smile, preparing, to resume the article in the newspaper over which she had stumbled, “perhaps the beautiful prince will come along one of these days.”
But Madame Robineau rebuked her for vain imaginings.
“It is true, what I said, that your education has been neglected. A young girl’s duty is not to look for princes, but to accept the husband chosen by the wisdom of her family.”
“Ma tante,” said Félise demurely, after a pause during which her aunt took up her work again. “If you would teach me how to embroider, perhaps I might learn to be useful in my future home.”
From this and many other conversations, Félise began to be aware of the subtle strategy of Bigourdin. On the plea of providing her with pro-maternal consolation, he had delivered her into the hands of the enemy. This became abundantly clear as the days went on. Aunt Clothilde, incited thereto by her uncle, was opening a deadly campaign in favour of Lucien Viriot. Now, the cathedral, though paralysing, could be borne for a season, and so could the blight that pervaded the house; but the campaign was intolerable. If she could have resented the action of one so beloved as Bigourdin, she would have resented his sending her to her Aunt Clothilde. Under the chaperonage of the respectable Madame Chauvet she had fallen into a pretty trap. She had found none of the promised sympathy. Aunt Clothilde, although receiving her with the affectionate hospitality due to a sister’s child, had from the first interview frozen the genial current of her little soul. The great bronze cross in itself repelled her. If it had been a nice, gentle little cross, rising and falling on a motherly bosom, it would have worked its all-human, adorable influence. But this was a harsh, aggressive, come-and-be-crucified sort of cross, with no suggestion of pity or understanding. The sallow, austere face above it might have easily been twisted into such a cross. It conveyed no invitation to the sufferer to pour out her troubles. Uncle Bigourdin was wrong again. Rather would Félise have poured out her troubles into the portentous ear of the Suisse at the Cathedral.
Her aunt and herself met nowhere on common ground. They were for ever at variance. Madame Robineau spoke disparagingly of the English, because they were Protestants and therefore heretics.
“But I am English, and I am not a heretic,” cried Félise.