oiced in being able to pity her who had so long oppressed
them; never had Dinah seemed to stand higher in the eyes of the
neighborhood.

The shriveled old man, more wrinkled, yellower, feebler than ever, gave
no sign; but Dinah sometimes detected in his eyes, as he looked at her,
a sort of icy venom which gave the lie to his increased politeness
and gentleness. She understood at last that this was not, as she had
supposed, a mere domestic squabble; but when she forced an explanation
with her "insect," as Monsieur Gravier called him, she found the cold,
hard impassibility of steel. She flew into a passion; she reproached
him for her life these eleven years past; she made--intentionally--what
women call a scene. But "little La Baudraye" sat in an armchair with his
eyes shut, and listened phlegmatically to the storm. And, as usual, the
dwarf got the better of his wife. Dinah saw that she had done wrong in
writing; she vowed never to write another line, and she kept her vow.

Then was there desolation in the Sancerrois.

"Why did not Madame de la Baudraye compose any more verses?" was the
universal cry.

At this time Madame de la Baudraye had no enemies; every one rushed to
see her, not a week passed without fresh introductions. The wife of the
presiding judge, an august _bourgeoise_, _nee_ Popinot-Chandier, desired
her son, a youth of two-and-twenty, to pay his humble respects to La
Baudraye, and flattered herself that she might see her Gatien in the
good graces of this Superior Woman.--The words Superior Woman had
superseded the absurd nickname of _The Sappho of Saint-Satur_.--This
lady, who for nine years had led the opposition, was so delighted at the
good reception accorded to her son, that she became loud in her praises
of the Muse of Sancerre.

"After all," she exclaimed, in reply to a tirade from Madame de Clagny,
who hated her husband's supposed mistress, "she is the handsomest and
cleverest woman in the whole province!"

After scrambling through so many brambles and setting off on so many
different roads, after dreaming of love in splendor and scenting the
darkest dramas, thinking such terrible joys would be cheaply purchased
so weary was she of her dreary existence, one day Dinah fell into the
pit she had sworn to avoid. Seeing Monsieur de Clagny always sacrificing
himself, and at last refusing a high appointment in Paris, where his
family wanted to see him, she said to herself, "He loves me!" She
vanquish