And if she did so?

Why not?  Had they the right to scorn her thus in public because she owned an official title and position?  Was not this vulgar salon of a furnished mansion her salon then?

Now it seemed to her that they were whispering about her; that they were sneering behind their fans, and that all these women knew her secret and her history.

Why should they not know them?  All Paris must have read that mocking, offensive and singular article:  The Mistress of an Archon!  All these people had, perhaps, learned it by heart.  There were people here who frequented the salons and who probably kept the article in their pockets.

Yes, that would be to commit a folly, to brave everything and to destroy all!

Sulpice, then, did not know her; he believed her to be insignificant because she was gentle, resigned to everything because she was devoted to his love and his glory?—­Ah! devoted even to the point of killing herself, devoted to the extent of dying, or living poor, working with her own hands, if only he loved her, if only he never lied to her!

“And here was his mistress!”

His mistress!  His mistress!

She repeated this name with increasing rage, reiterating it, inwardly digesting it, as if it were something terribly bitter.  His mistress, that lovely, insolent creature!  Yes, very lovely, but manifestly terrible and capable of driving a feeble being like Vaudrey to commit every folly, nay, worse, infamy.

“And it is such women that are loved!  Ah!  Idiots! idiots that we are!”

The first part of the concert was terminating.  Happily, too, for Adrienne was choking.  The minister must, as a matter of politeness, express his thanks to the cantatrices from the Opera, and to the actresses from the Comedie Francaise, the artistes whose names appeared on the programme.  Vaudrey was obliged to pass the rows of chairs in order to reach the little salon behind the stage, which served as a foyer.  Adrienne saw him coming to her side, and looking very pale, though he made an effort to smile.  He was uncomfortable and anxious.  In passing before Marianne, he tried to look aside, but Mademoiselle Kayser stopped him in spite of himself, by slightly extending her foot and smiling at him, when he turned toward her, with a prolonged, interested and strange expression.

Adrienne felt that she was about to faint.  She took a few tottering steps out of the salon, then she stopped as if her head were swimming.  Some one was on hand to support her.  She felt that a hand was holding her arm, she heard some one whisper in her ear: 

“It is too much, is it not?”

She recognized Lissac’s voice.

Guy looked at her for a moment, quite prepared for this great increase of suffering.

“Take me away,” she murmured.  “I can bear no more!—­I can bear no more!”