“Pray tell me, madame,” says Monsieur Foullepointe, “who is that queer man who has been talking about the Court of Assizes before a gentleman whose acquittal lately created such a sensation:  he is all the while blundering, like an ox in a bog, against everybody’s sore spot.  A lady burst into tears at hearing him tell of the death of a child, as she lost her own two months ago.”

“Who do you mean?”

“Why, that fat man, dressed like a waiter in a cafe, frizzled like a barber’s apprentice, there, he’s trying now to make himself agreeable to Madame de Fischtaminel.”

“Hush,” whispers the lady quite alarmed, “it’s the husband of the little woman next to me!”

“Ah, it’s your husband?” says Monsieur Foullepointe.  “I am delighted, madame, he’s a charming man, so vivacious, gay and witty.  I am going to make his acquaintance immediately.”

And Foullepointe executes his retreat, leaving a bitter suspicion in Caroline’s soul, as to the question whether her husband is really as handsome as she thinks him.

SECOND STYLE.  Caroline, annoyed by the reputation of Madame Schinner, who is credited with the possession of epistolary talents, and styled the “Sevigne of the note”, tired of hearing about Madame de Fischtaminel, who has ventured to write a little 32mo book on the education of the young, in which she has boldly reprinted Fenelon, without the style:—­Caroline has been working for six months upon a tale tenfold poorer than those of Berquin, nauseatingly moral, and flamboyant in style.

After numerous intrigues such as women are skillful in managing in the interest of their vanity, and the tenacity and perfection of which would lead you to believe that they have a third sex in their head, this tale, entitled “The Lotus,” appears in three installments in a leading daily paper.  It is signed Samuel Crux.

When Adolphe takes up the paper at breakfast, Caroline’s heart beats up in her very throat:  she blushes, turns pale, looks away and stares at the ceiling.  When Adolphe’s eyes settle upon the feuilleton, she can bear it no longer:  she gets up, goes out, comes back, having replenished her stock of audacity, no one knows where.

“Is there a feuilleton this morning?” she asks with an air that she thinks indifferent, but which would disturb a husband still jealous of his wife.

“Yes, one by a beginner, Samuel Crux.  The name is a disguise, clearly:  the tale is insignificant enough to drive an insect to despair, if he could read:  and vulgar, too:  the style is muddy, but then it’s—­”

Caroline breathes again.  “It’s—­” she suggests.