WHAT!To be married so soon.But this is unheard of.At the end of a month you become engaged to a man who is a stranger to you,and about whom you know nothing.The man may be deaf--there are so many kinds of deafness!--he may be sickly,tiresome,insufferable!
Don't you see,Renee,what they want with you?You are needful for carrying on the glorious stock of the l'Estorades,that is all.You will be buried in the provinces.Are these the promises we made each other?Were I you,I would sooner set off to the Hyeres islands in a caique,on the chance of being captured by an Algerian corsair and sold to the Grand Turk.Then I should be a Sultana some day,and wouldn't I make a stir in the harem while I was young--yes,and afterwards too!
You are leaving one convent to enter another.I know you;you are a coward,and you will submit to the yoke of family life with a lamblike docility.But I am here to direct you;you must come to Paris.There we shall drive the men wild and hold a court like queens.Your husband,sweetheart,in three years from now may become a member of the Chamber.I know all about members now,and I will explain it to you.You will work that machine very well;you can live in Paris,and become there what my mother calls a woman of fashion.Oh!you needn't suppose I will leave you in your grange!
Monday.
For a whole fortnight now,my dear,I have been living the life of society;one evening at the Italiens,another at the Grand Opera,and always a ball afterwards.Ah!society is a witching world.The music of the Opera enchants me;and whilst my soul is plunged in divine pleasure,I am the centre of admiration and the focus of all the opera-glasses.But a single glance will make the boldest youth drop his eyes.
I have seen some charming young men there;all the same,I don't care for any of them;not one has roused in me the emotion which I feel when I listen to Garcia in his splendid duet with Pellegrini in /Otello/.Heavens!how jealous Rossini must have been to express jealousy so well!What a cry in "Il mio cor si divide!"I'm speaking Greek to you,for you never heard Garcia,but then you know how jealous I am!
What a wretched dramatist Shakespeare is!Othello is in love with glory;he wins battles,he gives orders,he struts about and is all over the place while Desdemona sits at home;and Desdemona,who sees herself neglected for the silly fuss of public life,is quite meek all the time.Such a sheep deserves to be slaughtered.Let the man whom Ideign to love beware how he thinks of anything but loving me!
For my part,I like those long trials of the old-fashioned chivalry.
That lout of a young lord,who took offence because his sovereign-lady sent him down among the lions to fetch her glove,was,in my opinion,very impertinent,and a fool too.Doubtless the lady had in reserve for him some exquisite flower of love,which he lost,as he well deserved--the puppy!
But here am I running on as though I had not a great piece of news to tell you.My father is certainly going to represent our master the King at Madrid.I say /our/master,for I shall make part of the embassy.My mother wishes to remain here,and my father will take me so as to have some woman with him.
My dear,this seems to you,no doubt,very simple,but there are horrors behind it,all the same:in a fortnight I have probed the secrets of the house.My mother would accompany my father to Madrid if he would take M.de Canalis as a secretary to the embassy.But the King appoints the secretaries;the Duke dare neither annoy the King,who hates to be opposed,nor vex my mother;and the wily diplomat believes he has cut the knot by leaving the Duchess here.M.de Canalis,who is the great poet of the day,is the young man who cultivates my mother's society,and who no doubt studies diplomacy with her from three o'clock to five.Diplomacy must be a fine subject,for he is as regular as a gambler on the Stock Exchange.
The Duc de Rhetore,our elder brother,solemn,cold,and whimsical,would be extinguished by his father at Madrid,therefore he remains in Paris.Miss Griffith has found out also that Alphonse is in love with a ballet-girl at the Opera.How is it possible to fall in love with legs and pirouettes?We have noticed that my brother comes to the theatre only when Tullia dances there;he applauds the steps of this creature,and then goes out.Two ballet-girls in a family are,Ifancy,more destructive than the plague.My second brother is with his regiment,and I have not yet seen him.Thus it comes about that I have to act as the Antigone of His Majesty's ambassador.Perhaps I may get married in Spain,and perhaps my father's idea is a marriage there without dowry,after the pattern of yours with this broken-down guard of honor.My father asked if I would go with him,and offered me the use of his Spanish master.
"Spain,the country for castles in the air!"I cried."Perhaps you hope that it may mean marriages for me!"For sole reply he honored me with a meaning look.For some days he has amused himself with teasing me at lunch;he watches me,and Idissemble.In this way I have played with him cruelly as father and ambassador /in petto/.Hadn't he taken me for a fool?He asked me what I thought of this and that young man,and of some girls whom I had met in several houses.I replied with quite inane remarks on the color of their hair,their faces,and the difference in their figures.My father seemed disappointed at my crassness,and inwardly blamed himself for having asked me.
"Still,father,"I added,"don't suppose I am saying what I really think:mother made me afraid the other day that I had spoken more frankly than I ought of my impressions.""With your family you can speak quite freely,"my mother replied.
