crats who would not offer their
ungloved hand to a workman on the street; staff-majors ambitious of
honors and not of devotion, whom he felt crowding around him, with
smiles on their lips and applications in their pockets. How he preferred
the quiet pleasure of reading at the fireside, a chat with a friend, or
listening to one of Beethoven's sonatas, or a selection from Mendelssohn
played by Adrienne, whose companionship made the unmarked flight of the
hours pass more sweetly.

It was for that that he was created. At least he thought so and believed
it. And now this salon that he had simply desired to traverse, at once
seemed altogether delightful to him. And all this was due to his meeting
a divine creature in the midst of this crowd. He was eager to find
Marianne, to see her again. She aroused his curiosity as some enigma
might.

What, then, was this woman, was she virtuous or of questionable status?
Ah! she was a woman, or rather ten women in one, at the very least! A
woman from head to foot! A woman to her finger tips, a refined, Parisian
woman, perverse even in her virginity, and a virgin perhaps in her
perversity. A problem in fair flesh.

As Vaudrey hurriedly left the buffet, every one made way for him, and he
crossed the salons, eagerly looking out for Marianne. As he passed
along, he saw Guy de Lissac sitting on a chair upholstered in garnet
satin, his right hand resting on the gilded back and chatting with
Adrienne who was fanning herself leisurely. On noticing Sulpice, the
young woman smiled at him even at a distance, the happy smile of a
loving woman, and she embraced him with a pure glance, asking a question
without uttering a word, knowing well that he habitually left in great
haste.

"Do you wish to return?" was the meaning of her questioning glance.

He passed before her, replying with a smile, but without appearing to
have understood her, and disappeared in another salon, while Lissac said
to Adrienne:

"What about the ministry, madame?"

"Oh! don't speak to me of it!--it frightens me. In those rooms, it seems
to me that I am not at home. Do you know just what I feel? I fancy
myself travelling, never, however, leaving the house. Ministers
certainly should be bachelors. Men have all the honor, but their wives
endure all the weariness."

"There must, however, be at the bottom of this weariness, some pleasure,
since they so bitterly regret to take leave of it."

"Ah! _Dieu!_" said Adrienne. "Al