, she made herself in the depths of her heart the humble, abject,
and blindfold slave of the man who had made her. It must be noted, too,
that she was gifted with great good sense--the good sense of the people,
which made her education sound. In society she spoke little, and never
spoke evil of any one; she did not try to shine; she thought out
many things, listened well, and formed herself on the model of the
best-conducted women of good birth.

In 1815 Hulot followed the lead of the Prince de Wissembourg, his
intimate friend, and became one of the officers who organized the
improvised troops whose rout brought the Napoleonic cycle to a close at
Waterloo. In 1816 the Baron was one of the men best hated by the Feltre
administration, and was not reinstated in the Commissariat till 1823,
when he was needed for the Spanish war. In 1830 he took office as
the fourth wheel of the coach, at the time of the levies, a sort of
conscription made by Louis Philippe on the old Napoleonic soldiery. From
the time when the younger branch ascended the throne, having taken an
active part in bringing that about, he was regarded as an indispensable
authority at the War Office. He had already won his Marshal's baton,
and the King could do no more for him unless by making him minister or a
peer of France.

From 1818 till 1823, having no official occupation, Baron Hulot had gone
on active service to womankind. Madame Hulot dated her Hector's first
infidelities from the grand _finale_ of the Empire. Thus, for twelve
years the Baroness had filled the part in her household of _prima donna
assoluta_, without a rival. She still could boast of the old-fashioned,
inveterate affection which husbands feel for wives who are resigned to
be gentle and virtuous helpmates; she knew that if she had a rival,
that rival would not subsist for two hours under a word of reproof from
herself; but she shut her eyes, she stopped her ears, she would know
nothing of her husband's proceedings outside his home. In short, she
treated her Hector as a mother treats a spoilt child.

Three years before the conversation reported above, Hortense, at
the Theatre des Varietes, had recognized her father in a lower tier
stage-box with Jenny Cadine, and had exclaimed:

"There is papa!"

"You are mistaken, my darling; he is at the Marshal's," the Baroness
replied.

She too had seen Jenny Cadine; but instead of feeling a pang when she
saw how pretty she was, she said to hersel