ddle of the room; Mme. de Brecourt gazed out of the window,
wiping her tears; Mme. de Cliche grasped a newspaper, crumpled and
partly folded. Francie got a quick impression, moving her eyes from one
face to another, that old Mr. Probert was the worst; his mild ravaged
expression was terrible. He was the one who looked at her least; he went
to the fireplace and leaned on the mantel with his head in his hands. He
seemed ten years older.

"Ah mademoiselle, mademoiselle, mademoiselle!" said Maxime de Cliche
slowly, impressively, in a tone of the most respectful but most poignant
reproach.

"Have you seen it--have they sent it to you--?" his wife asked,
thrusting the paper toward her. "It's quite at your service!" But as
Francie neither spoke nor took it she tossed it upon the sofa, where, as
it opened, falling, the girl read the name of the Reverberator. Mme. de
Cliche carried her head very far aloft.

"She has nothing to do with it--it's just as I told you--she's
overwhelmed," said Mme. de Brecourt, remaining at the window.

"You'd do well to read it--it's worth the trouble," Alphonse de Brecourt
remarked, going over to his wife. Francie saw him kiss her as he noted
her tears. She was angry at her own; she choked and swallowed them; they
seemed somehow to put her in the wrong.

"Have you had no idea that any such monstrosity would be perpetrated?"
Mme. de Cliche went on, coming nearer to her. She had a manner of forced
calmness--as if she wished it to be understood that she was one of those
who could be reasonable under any provocation, though she were trembling
within--which made Francie draw back. "C'est pourtant rempli de
choses--which we know you to have been told of--by what folly, great
heaven! It's right and left--no one's spared--it's a deluge of the
lowest insult. My sister perhaps will have told you of the apprehensions
I had--I couldn't resist them, though I thought of nothing so awful
as this, God knows--the day I met you at Mr. Waterlow's with your
journalist."

"I've told her everything--don't you see she's aneantie? Let her go,
let her go!" cried Mme. de Brecourt all distrustfully and still at the
window.

"Ah your journalist, your journalist, mademoiselle!" said Maxime de
Cliche. "I'm very sorry to have to say anything in regard to any friend
of yours that can give you so little pleasure; but I promise myself the
satisfaction of administering him with these hands a dressing he won't
forget, if I ma