"That lady is very
cold to your husband. Yes, you have been made the victim of a
practical joke, and I will prove it to you. Yesterday Wenceslas was
dining with her--"
"Dining with her!" cried the young wife, starting to her feet, and
looking at her father with horror in every feature. "Yesterday! After
having had my letter! Oh, great God!--Why did I not take the veil
rather than marry? But now my life is not my own! I have the child!"
and she sobbed.
Her weeping went to Madame Hulot's heart. She came out of her room and
ran to her daughter, taking her in her arms, and asking her those
questions, stupid with grief, which first rose to her lips.
"Now we have tears," said the Baron to himself, "and all was going so
well! What is to be done with women who cry?"
"My child," said the Baroness, "listen to your father! He loves us all
--come, come--"
"Come, Hortense, my dear little girl, cry no more, you make yourself
too ugly!" said the Baron, "Now, be a little reasonable. Go sensibly
home, and I promise you that Wenceslas shall never set foot in that
woman's house. I ask you to make the sacrifice, if it is a sacrifice
to forgive the husband you love so small a fault. I ask you--for the
sake of my gray hairs, and of the love you owe your mother. You do not
want to blight my later years with bitterness and regret?"
Hortense fell at her father's feet like a crazed thing, with the
vehemence of despair; her hair, loosely pinned up, fell about her, and
she held out her hands with an expression that painted her misery.
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