ch
came from dear mistress's cellars, with flatteries to their hostess.
These visitors and their wives had a life-interest, as it were, in this
luxury; which was to them a saving of lights and fuel. Thus it came
to pass that in a circuit of fifteen miles and even as far as
Ville-aux-Fayes, every voice was ready to declare: "Madame Soudry does
the honors admirably. She keeps open house; every one enjoys her salon;
she knows how to carry herself and her fortune; she always says the
witty thing, she makes you laugh. And what splendid silver! There is not
another house like it short of Paris--"

The silver had been given to Mademoiselle Laguerre by Bouret. It was a
magnificent service made by the famous Germain, and Madame Soudry had
literally stolen it. At Mademoiselle Laguerre's death she merely took it
into her own room, and the heirs, who knew nothing of the value of their
inheritance, never claimed it.

For some time past the twelve or fifteen personages who composed the
leading society of Soulanges spoke of Madame Soudry as the _intimate
friend_ of Mademoiselle Laguerre, recoiling at the term "waiting-woman,"
and making believe that she had sacrificed herself to the singer as her
friend and companion.

Strange yet true! all these illusions became realities, and spread even
to the actual regions of the heart; Madame Soudry reigned supreme, in a
way, over her husband.

The gendarme, required to love a woman ten years older than himself who
kept the management of her fortune in her own hands, behaved to her in
the spirit of the ideas she had ended by adopting about her beauty. But
sometimes, when persons envied him or talked to him of his happiness,
he wished they were in his place, for, to hide his peccadilloes, he was
forced to take as many precautions as the husband of a young and adoring
wife; and it was not until very recently that he had been able to
introduce into the family a pretty servant-girl.

This portrait of the Queen of Soulanges may seem a little grotesque, but
many specimens of the same kind could be found in the provinces at
that period,--some more or less noble in blood, others belonging to the
higher banking-circles, like the widow of a receiver-general in Touraine
who still puts slices of veal upon her cheeks. This portrait, drawn from
nature, would be incomplete without the diamonds in which it is set;
without the surrounding courtiers, a sketch of whom is necessary, if
only to explain how for