Part 65 (1/2)
At last, the bell rang; it was Monsieur Clairval, cold, phlegmatic, taciturn. Next came Madame Mirallon, who always wore full dress, even at small parties. Next came a lawyer and a doctor, enthusiastic whist players, who were constantly disputing, one being a hot partisan of the short-suit lead, the other declaring that a good player would never stoop to that.
At every ring, f.a.n.n.y gazed eagerly at the door; she made a funny little wry face when she saw that the person who appeared was not he whom she expected.
”My gentleman keeps us waiting a long while!” she murmured; then ran to her sister.--”Adolphine, are you sure you told him Thursday? Perhaps you said some other day?”
”No. At all events, he knows that we have always received on Thursday.”
”He knows, he knows! When a man travels so much, he can easily forget.
It's after eight o'clock, and you see he doesn't come.”
”Eight o'clock isn't late. Never fear; he'll come.”
”You think so?”
”Oh! I am sure of it.”
”You are quite sure that he still loves me?”
”If he doesn't, why should he have told me that he did?”
”Oh! my dear, men say so many things that they don't think!”
”I can't understand how anyone can lie about love.”
”Ah! you make me laugh; love's just the thing they lie most about.--There's the bell. This time it must be he.”
f.a.n.n.y's expectation was deceived once more; Monsieur Batonnin appeared, with his inevitable smile, and his measured words.
”What a bore!” muttered the young woman, moving uneasily on her chair; ”it's that wretched Batonnin--the doll-faced man, as we used to call him at our parties.”
”Don't you like him? Why, he used to go to your house----”
”Well! what does that prove? Do you imagine that, in society, we are fond of everybody we receive? On the contrary, three-quarters of the time the greatest pleasure we have is in pa.s.sing all our guests in review and picking them to pieces.”
”Ah! what a pitiful sort of pleasure! But whom can you share it with?
for, if you speak ill of everybody----”
”You take a new-comer, and go and sit down with him in a corner of the salon; and there, on the pretext of telling him who people are, you give everybody a curry-combing. It's awfully amusing!”
”But the new-comer, if he isn't an idiot, must say to himself: 'As soon as I have gone, she'll say as much about me.'”
”Oh! we don't even wait till he's gone to do that.”
Monsieur Batonnin, having paid his respects to Monsieur Gerbault and to the card-players, joined the two sisters.
”How are the charming widow and her lovely sister? The rose and the bud--or, rather, two buds--or two roses; for, both being flowers, and the flowers being sisters, and having thorns--why----”