“Thou has said.  The absorbed Godefroid became fully acquainted with the family—­the tall Malvina, the frivolous Baroness, and the little lady of the dance.  He became a servant after the most conscientious and restricted fashion.  He was not scared away by the cadaverous remains of opulence; not he! by degrees he became accustomed to the threadbare condition of things.  It never struck the young man that the green silk damask and white ornaments in the drawing-room needed refurnishing.  The curtains, the tea-table, the knick-knacks on the chimney-piece, the rococo chandelier, the Eastern carpet with the pile worn down to the thread, the pianoforte, the little flowered china cups, the fringed serviettes so full of holes that they looked like open work in the Spanish fashion, the green sitting-room with the Baroness’ blue bedroom beyond it,—­it was all sacred, all dear to him.  It is only your stupid woman with the brilliant beauty that throws heart, brain, and soul into the shade, who can inspire forgetfulness like this; a clever woman never abuses her advantages; she must be small-natured and silly to gain such a hold upon a man.  Beaudenord actually loved the solemn old Wirth—­he has told me so himself!

“That old rogue regarded his future master with the awe which a good Catholic feels for the Eucharist.  Honest Wirth was a kind of Gaspard, a beer-drinking German sheathing his cunning in good-nature, much as a cardinal in the Middle Ages kept his dagger up his sleeve.  Wirth saw a husband for Isaure, and accordingly proceeded to surround Godefroid with the mazy circumlocutions of his Alsacien’s geniality, that most adhesive of all known varieties of bird-lime.

“Mme. d’Aldrigger was radically ‘improper.’  She thought love the most natural thing imaginable.  When Isaure and Malvina went out together to the Champs Elysees or the Tuileries, where they were sure to meet the young men of their set, she would simply say, ’A pleasant time to you, dear girls.’  Their friends among men, the only persons who might have slandered the sisters, championed them; for the extraordinary liberty permitted in the d’Aldriggers’ salon made it unique in Paris.  Vast wealth could scarcely have procured such evenings, the talk was good on any subject; dress was not insisted upon; you felt so much at home there that you could ask for supper.  The sisters corresponded as they pleased, and quietly read their letters by their mother’s side; it never occurred to the Baroness to interfere in any way; the adorable woman gave the girls the full benefits of her selfishness, and in a certain sense selfish persons are the easiest to live with; they hate trouble, and therefore do not trouble other people; they never beset the lives of their fellow-creatures with thorny advice and captious fault-finding; nor do they torment you with the waspish solicitude of excessive affection that must know all things and rule all things——­”

“This comes home,” said Blondet, “but my dear fellow, this is not telling a story, this is blague——­”