said Julien, "it would be very sad; but are you sure that you do
not exaggerate the situation? There is not so much calculation in life.
It is more mediocre and more facile. Perhaps the Prince and the Baron
have a vague project."

"A vague project?" interrupted Alba, shrugging her shoulders. "There is
never anything vague with a Hafner, you may depend. What if I were to
tell you that I am positive--do you hear--positive that it is he who
holds between his fingers the largest part of the Prince's debts, and
that he caused the sale by Ancona to obtain the bargain?"

"It is impossible!" exclaimed Dorsenne. "You saw him yourself yesterday
thinking of buying this and that object."

"Do not make me say any more," said Alba, passing over her brow and
her eyes two or three times her hand, upon which no ring sparkled--that
hand, very supple and white, whose movements betrayed extreme
nervousness. "I have already said too much. It is not my business, and
poor Fanny is only to me a recent friend, although I think her very
attractive and affectionate.... When I think that she is on the point of
pledging herself for life, and that there is no one, that there can be
no one, to cry: They lie to you! I am filled with compassion. That is
all. It is childish!"

It is always painful to observe in a young person the exact perception
of the sinister dealings of life, which, once entered into the mind,
never allows of the carelessness so natural at the age of twenty.

The impression of premature disenchantment Alba Steno had many times
given to Dorsenne, and it had indeed been the principal attraction to
the curious observer of the feminine character, who still was struck by
the terrible absence of illusion which such a view of the projects of
Fanny's father revealed. Whence did she know them? Evidently from Madame
Steno herself. Either the Baron and the Countess had talked of them
before the young girl too openly to leave her in any doubt, or she
had divined what they did not tell her, through their conversation. On
seeing her thus, with her bitter mouth, her bright eyes, so visibly a
prey to the fever of suppressed loathing, Dorsenne again was impressed
by the thought of her perfect perspicacity. It was probable that she had
applied the same force of thought to her mother's conduct. It seemed
to him that on raising, as she was doing, the wick of the silver lamp
beneath the large teakettle, that she was glancing sidewise at the
terrac