Madame de Palme had lost something of her gayety, and that a vague
preoccupation clouded the serenity of her brow. I could see her
dancing-partners surprised at her frequent absence of mind; she still
followed the whirl, but she no longer led it. Under pretext of fatigue,
she would leave suddenly and abruptly her partner's arm, in the midst of a
waltz, to go and sit in some corner with a pensive and even a pouting
look. If there happened to be a vacant seat next to mine, she threw
herself into it, and began from behind her fan some whimsical and
disjointed conversation like the following:

"If I cannot be a hermit, I am going to become a nun. What would you say,
if you saw me enter a convent to-morrow?"

"I should say that you would leave it the day after to-morrow."

"You have no confidence in my resolutions?"

"When they are unwise, no."

"I can only form unwise ones, according to you?"

"According to me, you waltz admirably. When a person waltzes as you do,
it's an art, almost a virtue."

"Is it customary to flatter one's friends?"

"I am not flattering you. I never speak a single word to you that I have
not carefully weighed, and that is not the most earnest expression of my
thought. I am a serious man, madam."