er
to detect or to practise artifice, and who found bitter amusement in
watching the girl's assumed 'sang-froid'. But the mask fell off at the
first touch of genuine sympathy. When Giselle, forgetful of a certain
coolness between them ever since Fred's departure, came to clasp her in
her arms, she showed only her true self, a girl suffering all the
bitterness of a cruel, humiliating desertion. Long talks ensued between
the friends, in which Jacqueline poured into Giselle's ear her sad
discoveries in the past, her sorrows and anxieties in the present, and
her vague plans for the future. "I must go away," she said; "I must
escape somewhere; I can not go on living with Madame de Nailles--I should
go mad, I should be tempted every day to upbraid her with her conduct."

Giselle made no attempt to curb an excitement which she knew would resist
all she could say to calm it. She feigned agreement, hoping thereby to
increase her future influence, and advised her friend to seek in a
convent the refuge that she needed. But she must do nothing rashly; she
should only consider it a temporary retreat whose motive was a wish to
remain for a while within reach of religious consolation. In that way she
would give people nothing to talk about, and her step mother could not be
offended. It was never of any use to get out of a difficulty by breaking
all the glass windows with a great noise, and good resolutions are made
firmer by being matured in quietness. Such were the lessons Giselle
herself had been taught by the Benedictine nuns, who, however deficient
they might be in the higher education of women, knew at least how to
bring up young girls with a view to making them good wives. Giselle
illustrated this day by day in her relations to a husband as disagreeable
as a husband well could be, a man of small intelligence, who was not even
faithful to her. But she did not cite herself as an example. She never
talked about herself, or her own difficulties.

"You are an angel of sense and goodness," sobbed Jacqueline. "I will do
whatever you wish me to do."

"Count upon me--count upon all your friends," said Madame de Talbrun,
tenderly.

And then, enumerating the oldest and the truest of these friends, she
unluckily named Madame d'Argy. Jacqueline drew herself back at once:

"Oh, for pity's sake!" she cried, "don't mention them to me!"

Already a comparison between Fred's faithful affection and Gerard de
Cymier's desertion had come into h