She met M. d'Aubepine one evening
at the Louvre, and took him to task, demanding when his wife was to
hear from him, and fairly putting him out of countenance in the
presence of the Queen of England. She came home triumphant at what
she had done, and raised our hopes again, but in fact, though it
impelled him to action, there was now mortified vanity added to
indifference and impatience of the yoke.
There was a letter the next day. Half an hour after receiving it I
found Cecile sunk down on the floor of her apartment, upon which all
her wardrobe was strewn about as if to be packed up. She fell into
my arms weeping passionately, and declaring she must leave us. to
leave us and set up her menage with her husband had always been her
ambition, so it was plain that this was not what she meant; but for a
long time she neither would nor could tell me, or moan out anything
but a 'convent,' 'how could he?' and 'my children.'
At last she let me read the letter, and a cruel one it was, beginning
'Madame,' and giving her the choice of returning to Chateau
d'Aubepine under the supervision of Madame Croquelebois, or of
entering a convent, and sending her son to be bred up at the Chateau
under a tutor and the intendant. She had quite long enough lived
with Madame de Bellaise, and that young Englishman, her brother, who
was said to be charming.
It was an absolute insult to us all, and as I saw at once was the
work of Madame Croquelebois, accepted by the young Count as a
convenient excuse for avoiding the ennui and expense of setting up a
household with his wife, instead of living a gay bachelor life with
his Prince.
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