ay herself was vain enough to
be willing that this should be generally accepted, and it is certain
that she showed a friendship for him which, considering the manners of
the time, was invitingly open to misconception. Again, she was jealous
of her sister-in-law, Madame d'Houdetot, if for no other reason than
that the latter, being the wife of a Norman noble, had access to the
court, and this was unattainable by the wife of a farmer-general. Hence
Madame d'Epinay's barely-concealed mortification when she heard of the
meetings in the forest, the private suppers, the moonlight rambles in
the park. When Saint Lambert first became uneasy as to the relations
between Rousseau and his mistress, and wrote to her to say that he was
so, Rousseau instantly suspected that Madame d'Epinay had been his
informant. Theresa confirmed the suspicion by tales of baskets and
drawers ransacked by Madame d'Epinay in search of Madame d'Houdetot's
letters to him. Whether these tales were true or not, we can never know;
we can only say that Madame d'Epinay was probably not incapable of these
meannesses, and that there is no reason to suppose that she took the
pains to write directly to Saint Lambert a piece of news which she was
writing to Grimm, knowing that he was then in communication with Saint
Lambert. She herself suspected that Theresa had written to Saint
Lambert,[299] but it may be doubted whether Theresa's imagination could
have risen to such feat as writing to a marquis, and a marquis in what
would have seemed to her to be remote and inaccessible parts of the
earth. All this, however, has become ghostly for us; a puzzle that can
never be found out, nor be worth finding out. Rousseau was persuaded
that Madame d'Epinay was his betrayer, and was seized by one of his
blackest and most stormful moods. In reply to an affectionate letter
from her, inquiring why she had not seen him for so long, he wrote thus:
"I can say nothing to you yet. I wait until I am better informed, and
this I shall be sooner or later. Meanwhile, be certain that accused
innocence will find a champion ardent enough to make calumniators
repent, whoever they may be." It is rather curious that so strange a
missive as this, instead of provoking Madame d'Epinay to anger, was
answered by a warmer and more affectionate letter than the first. To
this Rousseau replied with increased vehemence, charged with dark and
mysteriously worded suspicion. Still Madame d'Epinay remained will