oud through the fall, disdainful of pardon. Her way of
gathering her thick hair into a crown of plaits above the broad, curving
lines of the bandeaux upon her forehead, added to the queenliness of her
face. Imagination could discover the ducal coronet of Burgundy in the
spiral threads of her golden hair; all the courage of her house seemed
to gleam from the great lady's brilliant eyes, such courage as women
use to repel audacity or scorn, for they were full of tenderness for
gentleness. The outline of that little head, so admirably poised above
the long, white throat, the delicate, fine features, the subtle curves
of the lips, the mobile face itself, wore an expression of delicate
discretion, a faint semblance of irony suggestive of craft and
insolence. Yet it would have been difficult to refuse forgiveness to
those two feminine failings in her; for the lines that came out in her
forehead whenever her face was not in repose, like her upward glances
(that pathetic trick of manner), told unmistakably of unhappiness, of
a passion that had all but cost her her life. A woman, sitting in the
great, silent salon, a woman cut off from the rest of the world in this
remote little valley, alone, with the memories of her brilliant, happy,
and impassioned youth, of continual gaiety and homage paid on all sides,
now replaced by the horrors of the void--was there not something in the
sight to strike awe that deepened with reflection? Consciousness of her
own value lurked in her smile. She was neither wife nor mother, she was
an outlaw; she had lost the one heart that could set her pulses beating
without shame; she had nothing from without to support her reeling soul;
she must even look for strength from within, live her own life, cherish
no hope save that of forsaken love, which looks forward to Death's
coming, and hastens his lagging footsteps. And this while life was in
its prime. Oh! to feel destined for happiness and to die--never having
given nor received it! A woman too! What pain was this! These thoughts
flashing across M. de Nueil's mind like lightning, left him very humble
in the presence of the greatest charm with which woman can be invested.
The triple aureole of beauty, nobleness, and misfortune dazzled him; he
stood in dreamy, almost open-mouthed admiration of the Vicomtesse. But
he found nothing to say to her.

Mme. de Beauseant, by no means displeased, no doubt, by his surprise,
held out her hand with a kindly but imperi