his sister should be at the service of the genius of Lincoln, as he
himself was. Moreover, if, since the marriage with her brother's friend,
his sister had been stirred by the tempest of a moral tragedy, Florent
did not suspect it. When had he studied Lydia, the silent, reserved
Lydia, of whom he had once for all formed an opinion, as is the almost
invariable custom of relative with relative? Those who have seen us when
young are like those who see us daily. The images which they trace of us
always reproduce what we were at a certain moment--scarcely ever what we
are. Florent considered his sister very good, because he had formerly
found her so; very gentle, because she had never resisted him; not
intelligent, because she did not seem sufficiently interested in the
painter's work; as for the suffering and secret rebellion of the
oppressed creature, crushed between his blind partiality and the
selfishness of a scornful husband, he did not even suspect them, much
less the terrible resolution of which that apparent resignation was
capable.

If he had trembled when Madame Steno began to interest herself in
Lincoln, it was solely for the work of the latter, so much the more as
for a year he had perceived not a decline but a disturbance in the
painting of that artist, too voluntary not to be unequal. Then Florent
had seen, on the other hand, the nerve of Maitland reawakened in the
warmth of that little intrigue.

The portrait of Alba promised to be a magnificent study, worthy of being
placed beside the famous 'Femme en violet et en jaune,' which those
envious of Lincoln always remembered. Moreover, the painter had finished
with unparalleled ardor two large compositions partly abandoned. In the
face of that proof of a fever of production more and more active, how
would not Florent have blessed Madame Steno, instead of cursing her, so