The maternal instinct as we have it here at Paris confounds me.  I do not comprehend it.  Here was a mother who did not particularly love her child, who would not be inconsolable at her loss, would not ruin her own complexion by care of her during illness, would send her through fire and water and every torture to secure or maintain a desirable rank, who yet would entangle herself deeply in intrigue, would not hesitate to tarnish her own reputation, and would, in fact, raise heaven and earth to—­endow this child with a brilliant match.  And Mme. de St. Cyr seemed to regard Delphine, still further, as a cool matter of Art.

These little confidences, moreover, are provoking.  They put you yourself so entirely out of the question.

“Mlle. de St. Cyr’s beauty is peerless,” I said, slightly chagrined, and at a loss.  “If hearts were trumps, instead of diamonds!”

“We are poor,” resumed Madame, pathetically.  “Delphine is not an heiress.  Delphine is proud.  She will not stoop to charm.  Her coquetry is that of an Amazon.  Her kisses are arrows.  She is Medusa!” And Madame, her mother, shivered.

Here, with her hair knotted up and secured by a tiny dagger, her gauzy drapery gathered in her arm, Delphine floated down the green alley toward us, as if in a rosy cloud.  But this soft aspect never could have been more widely contradicted than by the stony repose and cutting calm of her beautiful face.

“The Marquis of G.,” said her mother, “he also arrives ambassador.  Has he talent?  Is he brilliant?  Wealthy, of course,—­but gauche?”

Therewith I sketched for them the Marquis and his surroundings.

“It is charming,” said Madame.  “Delphine, do you attend?”

“And why?” asked Delphine, half concealing a yawn with her dazzling hand.  “It is wearisome; it matters not to me.”

“But he will not go to marry himself in France,” said her mother.  “Oh, these English.” she added, with a laugh, “yourself, Monsieur, being proof of it, will not mingle blood, lest the Channel should still flow between the little red globules!  You will go? but to return shortly?  You will dine with me soon? Au revoir!” and she gave me her hand graciously, while Delphine bowed as if I were already gone, threw herself into a garden-chair, and commenced pouring the wine on a stone for a little tame snake which came out and lapped it.

Such women as Mme. de St. Cyr have a species of magnetism about them.  It is difficult to retain one’s self-respect before them,—­for no other reason than that one is, at the moment, absorbed into their individuality, and thinks and acts with them.  Delphine must have had a strong will, and perpetual antagonism did not weaken it.  As for me, Madame had, doubtless, reasons of her own for tearing aside these customary bands of reserve,—­reasons which, if you do not perceive, I shall not enumerate.

“Have you met with anything further in your search, Sir?” asked my valet, next morning.