You have left a distracted lover,
and he is moving heaven and earth to gain you. Have you considered?
You would gain a position. He has great influence with M. le Prince,
who can do anything here.'
'Ah! Mademoiselle! Your Royal Highness too!' was all I could say,
but I could not silence her. M. de Lamont had interested the Prince
of Conde in his cause, and Mademoiselle, with her insane idea of
marrying the hero, in case the poor young Princess should die (and
some people declared that she was in a decline), would have thought
me a small sacrifice to please him. So I was beset on all sides. I
think the man was really enough in love to affect to be distracted.
Though far less good-looking in my early youth than my sister, I was
so tall and blonde as to have a distinguished air, and my
indifference piqued my admirer into a resolution to conquer me.
Mademoiselle harangued me on the absurdity of affecting to be a
disconsolate widow, on the step in rank that I should obtain, and the
antiquity of M. de Lamont's pedigree, also upon all the ladies of
antiquity she could recollect who had married again; and when I
called Artemisia and Cornelia to the front in my defence, she
betrayed her secret, like poor Cecile, and declared that it was very
obstinate and disobedient in me not to consent to do what would
recommend HER to the Prince.
Next came M. d'Aubepine, poor young man, with the air of reckless
dissipation that sat so ill on a face still so youthful, and a still
more ridiculous affectation of worldly wisdom.
Pages:
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269