“How long is it,” asked the countess, “since any of your family have paid a visit to the Thuilliers’?”

“If my memory serves me,” said Phellion, “I think we were all there the Sunday after the dinner for the house-warming.”

“Fifteen whole days of absence!” exclaimed the countess; “and you think that nothing of importance could happen in fifteen days?”

“No, indeed! did not three glorious days in July, 1830, cast down a perjured dynasty and found the noble order of things under which we now live?”

“You see it yourself!” said the countess.  “Now, tell me, during that evening, fifteen days ago, did nothing serious take place between your son and Celeste?”

“Something did occur,” replied Phellion,—­“a very disagreeable conversation on the subject of my son’s religious opinions; it must be owned that our good Celeste, who in all other respects has a charming nature, is a trifle fanatic in the matter of piety.”

“I agree to that,” said the countess; “but she was brought up by the mother whom you know; she was never shown the face of true piety; she saw only the mimicry of it.  Repentant Magdalens of the Madame Colleville species always assume an air of wishing to retire to a desert with their death’s-head and crossed bones.  They think they can’t get salvation at a cheaper rate.  But after all, what did Celeste ask of Monsieur Felix?  Merely that he would read ’The Imitation of Christ.’”

“He has read it, madame,” said Phellion, “and he thinks it a book extremely well written; but his convictions—­and that is a misfortune —­have not been affected by the perusal.”

“And do you think he shows much cleverness in not assuring his mistress of some little change in his inflexible convictions?”

“My son, madame, has never received from me the slightest lesson in cleverness; loyalty, uprightness, those are the principles I have endeavored to inculcate in him.”

“It seems to me, monsieur, that there is no want of loyalty when, in dealing with a troubled mind, we endeavor to avoid wounding it.  But let us agree that Monsieur Felix owed it to himself to be that iron door against which poor Celeste’s applications beat in vain; was that a reason for keeping away from her and sulking in his tent for fifteen whole days?  Above all, ought he to have capped these sulks by a proceeding which I can’t forgive, and which—­only just made known to us—­has struck the girl’s heart with despair, and also with a feeling of extreme irritation?”

“My son capable of any such act! it is quite impossible, madame!” cried Phellion.  “I know nothing of this proceeding; but I do not hesitate to affirm that you have been ill-informed.”

“And yet, nothing is more certain.  Young Colleville, who came home to-day for his half-holiday, has just told us that Monsieur Felix, who had previously gone with the utmost punctuality to hear him recite has ceased entirely to have anything to do with him.  Unless your son is ill, I do not hesitate to say that this neglect is the greatest of blunders, in the situation in which he now stands with the sister he ought not to have chosen this moment to put an end to these lessons.”