neuil, with simplicity.

Charming phrase! so often used in the world of society,--how the north
wind blows through it.

"Why so?" asked Modeste of the pretty young girl who had lately left the
Sacre-Coeur.

"The great poet," said the pious duchess--making a sign to her daughter
to be silent--"left Madame de Chaulieu without a letter for more than
two weeks after he went to Havre, having told her that he went there for
his health--"

Modeste made a hasty movement, which caught the attention of Laure,
Helene, and Mademoiselle d'Herouville.

"--and during that time," continued the devout duchess, "she was
endeavoring to have him appointed commander of the Legion of honor, and
minister at Baden."

"Oh, that was shameful in Canalis; he owes everything to her," exclaimed
Mademoiselle d'Herouville.

"Why did not Madame de Chaulieu come to Havre?" asked Modeste of Helene,
innocently.

"My dear," said the Duchesse de Verneuil, "she would let herself be cut
in little pieces without saying a word. Look at her,--she is regal; her
head would smile, like Mary Stuart's, after it was cut off; in fact, she
has some of that blood in her veins."

"Did she not write to him?" asked Modeste.

"Diane tells me," answered the duchess, prompted by a nudge from
Mademoiselle d'Herouville, "that in answer to Canalis's first letter she
made a cutting reply a few days ago."

This explanation made Modeste blush with shame for the man before her;
she longed, not to crush him under her feet, but to revenge herself by
one of those malicious acts that are sharper than a dagger's thrust. She
looked haughtily at the Duchesse de Chaulieu--

"Monsieur Melchior!" she said.

All the women snuffed the air and looked alternately at the duchess, who
was talking in an undertone to Canalis over the embroidery-frame,
and then at the young girl so ill brought up as to disturb a lovers'
meeting,--a think not permissible in any society. Diane de Maufrigneuse
nodded, however, as much as to say, "The child is in the right of it."
All the women ended by smiling at each other; they were enraged with a
woman who was fifty-six years old and still handsome enough to put her
fingers into the treasury and steal the dues of youth. Melchior looked
at Modeste with feverish impatience, and made the gesture of a master
to a valet, while the duchess lowered her head with the movement of a
lioness disturbed at a meal; her eyes, fastened on the canvas, emitted
red flam