ed Mademoiselle de Corandeuil, for
she held the praise of others in sovereign displeasure, "is a Bergenheim
like all the Bergenheims present, past, and future, including your
little sister-in-law, who appears more as if she had been brought up
with boys than at the 'Sacred Heart.' He is a worthy son of his father
there," said she, pointing to one of the portraits near the young
Royal-Nassau officer; "and he was the most brutal, unbearable, and
detestable of all the dragoons in Lorraine; so much so that he got
into three quarrels at Nancy in one month, and at Metz, over a game
of checkers, he killed the poor Vicomte de Megrigny, who was worth a
hundred of him and danced so well! Some one described Bergenheim as
being 'proud as a peacock, as stubborn as a mule, and as furious as
a lion!' Ugly race! ugly race! What I say to you now, Clemence, is
to excuse your husband's faults, for it would be time lost to try to
correct them. However, all men are alike; and since you are Madame de
Bergenheim, you must accept your fate and bear it as well as possible.
And then, if you have your troubles, you still have your good aunt to
whom you can confide them and who will not allow you to be tyrannized
over. I will speak to your husband."

Clemence saw, from the first words of this tirade, that she must arm
herself with resignation; for anything which concerned the Bergenheims
aroused one of the hobbies which the old maid rode with a most
complacent spite; so she settled herself back in her chair like a person
who would at least be comfortable while she listened to a tiresome
discourse, and busied herself during this lecture caressing with the tip
of a very shapely foot the top of one of the andirons.

"But, aunt," said she at last, when the tirade was over, and she gave a
rather drawling expression to her voice, "I can not understand why you
have taken this idea into your head that Christian renders me unhappy.
I repeat it, it is impossible that one should be kinder to me than he,
and, on my side, I have the greatest respect and friendship for him."

"Very well, if he is such a pearl of husbands, if you live so much like
turtle-doves-and, to tell the truth, I do not believe a word of it--what
causes this ennui of which you complain and which has been perfectly
noticeable for some time? When I say ennui, it is more than that; it is
sadness, it is grief? You grow thinner every day; you are as pale as
a ghost; just at this moment, your