houses, of professing
their royalist sentiments, pious and correct to a supreme degree; by
respecting all that should be respected, by condemning all that should
be condemned, by never being mistaken on a point of worldly dogma or
hesitating over a detail of etiquette, they had succeeded in passing
in the eyes of many for the finest flower of high life. Their opinion
formed a sort of code of correct form and their presence in a house gave
it a true title of distinction.

The Corbelles were relatives of the Comte de Guilleroy.

"Well," said the Duchess in astonishment, "and your wife?"

"One instant, one little instant," pleaded the Count. "There is a
surprise: she is just about to come."

When Madame de Guilleroy, as the bride of a month, had entered
society, she was presented to the Duchesse de Mortemain, who loved her
immediately, adopted her, and patronized her.

For twenty years this friendship never had diminished, and when the
Duchess said, "_Ma petite_," one still heard in her voice the tenderness
of that sudden and persistent affection. It was at her house that the
painter and the Countess had happened to meet.

Musadieu approached the group. "Has the Duchess been to see the
exposition of the Intemperates?" he inquired.

"No; what is that?"

"A group of new artists, impressionists in a state of intoxication. Two
of them are very fine."

The great lady murmured, with disdain: "I do not like the jests of those
gentlemen."

Authoritative, brusque, barely tolerating any other opinion than
her own, and founding hers solely on the consciousness of her social
station, considering, without being able to give a good reason for it,
that artists and learned men were merely intelligent mercenaries charged
by God to amuse society or to render service to it, she had no other
basis for her judgments than the degree of astonishment or of pleasure
she experienced at the sight of a thing, the reading of a book, or the
recital of a discovery.

Tall, stout, heavy, red, with a loud voice, she passed as having the
air of a great lady because nothing embarrassed her; she dared to say
anything and patronized the whole world, including dethroned princes,
with her receptions in their honor, and even the Almighty by her
generosity to the clergy and her gifts to the churches.

"Does the Duchess know," Musadieu continued, "that they say the assassin
of Marie Lambourg has been arrested?"

Her interest was awakened at once.