There she was, in all the lustre of her youth and beauty, displaying
the whitest shoulders and the most ravishing lines of beauty. Her
face, which still reflected the pleasures of the evening, seemed to
vie with the brilliancy of her satin gown; her eyes to rival the blaze
of her diamonds; and her skin to cope with the soft whiteness of the
marabouts which tied in her hair, set off the ebon tresses and the
ringlets dangling from her headdress. Her tender voice would stir the
chords of the most insensible hearts; in a word, so powerfully did she
wake up love in the human breast that Robert d'Abrissel himself would
perhaps have yielded to her.

The baron glanced at his wife, who, overcome with fatigue, had sunk to
sleep in a corner of the carriage. He compared, in spite of himself,
the toilette of Louise and that of Emilie. Now on occasions of this
kind the presence of a wife is singularly calculated to sharpen the
unquenchable desires of a forbidden love. Moreover, the glances of the
baron, directed alternately to his wife and to her friend, were easy
to interpret, and Madame B----- interpreted them.

"Poor Louise," she said, "she is overtired. Going out does not suit
her, her tastes are so simple. At Ecouen she was always reading--"

"And you, what used you to do?"

"I, sir? Oh, I thought about nothing but acting comely. It was my
passion!"

"But why do you so rarely visit Madame de V-----? We have a country
house at Saint-Prix, where we could have a comedy acted, in a little
theatre which I have built there."