ll the laws of prudence and the
principles of conduct upon which society is based. She put from her like
a dream the thought of bliss and tender harmony of love promised by Mme.
de Listomere-Landon's mature experience, and waited resignedly for the
end of her troubles with a hope that she might die young.

Her health had declined daily since her return from Touraine; her
life seemed to be measured to her in suffering; yet her ill-health was
graceful, her malady seemed little more than languor, and might well be
taken by careless eyes for a fine lady's whim of invalidism.

Her doctors had condemned her to keep to the sofa, and there among
her flowers lay the Marquise, fading as they faded. She was not strong
enough to walk, nor to bear the open air, and only went out in a closed
carriage. Yet with all the marvels of modern luxury and invention about
her, she looked more like an indolent queen than an invalid. A few of
her friends, half in love perhaps with her sad plight and her fragile
look, sure of finding her at home, and speculating no doubt upon her
future restoration to health, would come to bring her the news of the
day, and kept her informed of the thousand and one small events which
fill life in Paris with variety. Her melancholy, deep and real though it
was was still the melancholy of a woman rich in many ways. The Marquise
d'Aiglemont was like a flower, with a dark insect gnawing at its root.

Occasionally she went into society, not to please herself, but in
obedience to the exigencies of the position which her husband aspired to
take. In society her beautiful voice and the perfection of her singing
could always gain the social success so gratifying to a young woman; but
what was social success to her, who drew nothing from it for her heart
or her hopes? Her husband did not care for music. And, moreover, she
seldom felt at her ease in salons, where her beauty attracted homage not
wholly disinterested. Her position excited a sort of cruel compassion,
a morbid curiosity. She was suffering from an inflammatory complaint not
infrequently fatal, for which our nosology as yet has found no name, a
complaint spoken of among women in confidential whispers. In spite of
the silence in which her life was spent, the cause of her ill-health
was no secret. She was still but a girl in spite of her marriage; the
slightest glance threw her into confusion. In her endeavor not to blush,
she was always laughing, always apparently