ou are a wretch. Get you gone!
Get you gone, I say!"

And if she did so?

Why not? Had they the right to scorn her thus in public because she
owned an official title and position? Was not this vulgar salon of a
furnished mansion _her_ salon then?

Now it seemed to her that they were whispering about her; that they were
sneering behind their fans, and that all these women knew her secret and
her history.

Why should they not know them? All Paris must have read that mocking,
offensive and singular article: _The Mistress of an Archon_! All these
people had, perhaps, learned it by heart. There were people here who
frequented the salons and who probably kept the article in their
pockets.

Yes, that would be to commit a folly, to brave everything and to destroy
all!

Sulpice, then, did not know her; he believed her to be insignificant
because she was gentle, resigned to everything because she was devoted
to his love and his glory?--Ah! devoted even to the point of killing
herself, devoted to the extent of dying, or living poor, working with
her own hands, if only he loved her, if only he never lied to her!

"And here was his mistress!"

His mistress! His mistress!

She repeated this name with increasing rage, reiterating it, inwardly
digesting it, as if it were something terribly bitter. His mistress,
that lovely, insolent creature! Yes, very lovely, but manifestly
terrible and capable of driving a feeble being like Vaudrey to commit
every folly, nay, worse, infamy.

"And it is such women that are loved! Ah! Idiots! idiots that we are!"

The first part of the concert was terminating. Happily, too, for
Adrienne was choking. The minister must, as a matter of politeness,
express his thanks to the cantatrices from the Opera, and to the
actresses from the Comedie Francaise, the artistes whose names appeared
on the programme. Vaudrey was obliged to pass the rows of chairs in
order to reach the little salon behind the stage, which served as a
foyer. Adrienne saw him coming to her side, and looking very pale,
though he made an effort to smile. He was uncomfortable and anxious. In
passing before Marianne, he tried to look aside, but Mademoiselle Kayser
stopped him in spite of himself, by slightly extending her foot and
smiling at him, when he turned toward her, with a prolonged, interested
and strange expression.

Adrienne felt that she was about to faint. She took a few tottering
steps out of the salon, then she stop