“So,” said Phellion, “in one of the rare occasions of life when reason and inclination blend together, you think you must be guided solely by the question of material interests.  Celeste, as we know, has no inclination for Monsieur de la Peyrade.  Brought up with Felix—­”

“Brought up with Felix!” interrupted Brigitte.  “She was given a period of time to choose between Monsieur de la Peyrade and your son,—­that’s how we coerce her, if you please,—­and she would not take Monsieur Felix, whose atheism is too well known.”

“You are mistaken, mademoiselle, my son is not an atheist; for Voltaire himself doubted if there could be atheists; and no later than yesterday, in this house, an ecclesiastic, as admirable for his talents as for his virtues, after making a magnificent eulogy of my son, expressed the desire to know him.”

“Parbleu! yes, to convert him,” said Brigitte.  “But as for this marriage, I am sorry to tell you that the mustard is made too late for the dinner; Thuillier will never renounce his la Peyrade.”

“Mademoiselle,” said Phellion, rising, “I feel no humiliation for the useless step I have this day taken; I do not even ask you to keep it secret, for I shall myself mention it to our friends and acquaintances.”

“Tell it to whom you like, my good man,” replied Brigitte, acrimoniously.  “Because your son has discovered a star,—­if, indeed, he did discover it, and not that old fool the government decorated—­do you expect him to marry a daughter of the King of the French?”

“Enough,” said Phellion, “we will say no more.  I might answer that, without depreciating the Thuilliers, the Orleans family seems to me more distinguished; but I do not like to introduce acerbity into the conversation, and therefore, begging you to receive the assurance of my humble respects, I retire.”

So saying, he made his exit majestically, and left Brigitte with the arrow of his comparison, discharged after the manner of the Parthian “in extremis,” sticking in her mind, and she herself in a temper all the more savage because already, the evening before, Madame Thuillier, after the guests were gone, had the incredible audacity to say something in favor of Felix.  Needless to relate that the poor helot was roughly put down and told to mind her own business.  But this attempt at a will of her own in her sister-in-law had already put the old maid in a vile humor, and Phellion, coming to reopen the subject, exasperated her.  Josephine, the cook, and the “male domestic,” received the after-clap of the scene which had just taken place.  Brigitte found that in her absence everything had been done wrong, and putting her own hand to the work, she hoisted herself on a chair, at the risk of her neck, to reach the upper shelves of the closet, where her choicest china, for gala days, was carefully kept under lock and key.

This day, which for Brigitte began so ill, was, beyond all gainsaying, one of the stormiest and most portentous of this narrative.