France of that eminently ordinary person her husband, and a dullard
into a power in the land. But, pray tell me this, did Lord Grenville
die for her sake, do you think, as some women say?"

"Possibly. Since that adventure, real or imaginary, she is very much
changed, poor thing! She has not gone into society since. Four years
of constancy--that is something in Paris. If she is here to-night----"
Here Mme. Firmiani broke off, adding with a mysterious expression, "I
am forgetting that I must say nothing. Go and talk with her."

For a moment Charles stood motionless, leaning lightly against the
frame of the doorway, wholly absorbed in his scrutiny of a woman who
had become famous, no one exactly knew how or why. Such curious
anomalies are frequent enough in the world. Mme. d'Aiglemont's
reputation was certainly no more extraordinary than plenty of other
great reputations. There are men who are always in travail of some
great work which never sees the light, statisticians held to be
profound on the score of calculations which they take very good care
not to publish, politicians who live on a newspaper article, men of
letters and artists whose performances are never given to the world,
men of science, much as Sganarelle is a Latinist for those who know no
Latin; there are the men who are allowed by general consent to possess
a peculiar capacity for some one thing, be it for the direction of
arts, or for the conduct of an important mission. The admirable
phrase, "A man with a special subject," might have been invented on
purpose for these acephalous species in the domain of literature and
politics.

Charles gazed longer than he intended. He was vexed with himself for
feeling so strongly interested; it is true, however, that the lady's