family trying to disinherit her husband's children to enrich the others
whom she loves better; or it is the husband who tries to leave all his
property to the child who has done his best to earn his mother's hatred.
And then begin quarrels, and fears, and deeds, and defeasances, and sham
sales, and trusts, and all the rest of it; a pretty mess, in fact, it
is pitiable, upon my honor, pitiable! There are fathers that will spend
their whole lives in cheating their children and robbing their wives.
Yes, robbing is the only word for it. We were talking of tragedy; oh!
I can assure you of this that if we were at liberty to tell the real
reasons of some donations that I know of, our modern dramatists would
have the material for some sensational _bourgeois_ dramas. How the wife
manages to get her way, as she invariably does, I cannot think; for in
spite of appearances, and in spite of their weakness, it is always the
women who carry the day. Ah! by the way, they don't take _me_ in. I
always know the reason at the bottom of those predilections which the
world politely styles 'unaccountable.' But in justice to the husbands, I
must say that _they_ never discover anything. You will tell me that this
is a merciful dispens--"

Helene had come back to the drawing-room with her father, and was
listening attentively. So well did she understand all that was said,
that she gave her mother a frightened glance, feeling, with a child's
quick instinct, that these remarks would aggravate the punishment
hanging over her. The Marquise turned her white face to Vandenesse; and,
with terror in her eyes, indicated her husband, who stood with his eyes
fixed absently on the flower pattern of the carpet. The diplomatist,
accomplished man of the world though he was, could no longer contain his
wrath, he gave the man of law a withering glance.

"Step this way, sir," he said, and he went hurriedly to the door of the
ante-chamber; the notary left his sentence half finished, and followed,
quaking, and the husband and wife were left together.

"Now, sir" said the Marquise de Vandenesse--he banged the drawing-room
door, and spoke with concentrated rage--"ever since dinner you have done
nothing but make blunders and talk folly. For heaven's sake, go. You
will make the most frightful mischief before you have done. If you are
a clever man in your profession, keep to your profession; and if by any
chance you should go into society, endeavor to be more circumsp