“I am trying to talk sensibly to you, and you, on the contrary—­Understand me, Bettina; I have an experience of the world which you can not have.  Since our arrival in Paris, we have been launched into a very brilliant, very animated, very aristocratic society.  You might have been already, if you had liked, marchioness or princess.”

“Yes, but I did not like.”

“It would not matter to you to be called Madame Reynaud?”

“Not in the least, if I love him.”

“Ah! you return always to—­”

“Because that is the true question.  There is no other.  Now I will be sensible in my turn.  This question—­I grant that this is not quite settled, and that I have, perhaps, allowed myself to be too easily persuaded.  You see how sensible I am.  Jean is going away to-morrow, I shall not see him again for three weeks.  During these three weeks I shall have ample time to question myself, to examine myself, in a word, to know my own mind.  Under my giddy manner, I am serious and thoughtful, you know that?”

“Oh, yes, I know it.”

“Well, I will make this petition to you, as I would have addressed it to our mother had she been here.  If, in three weeks, I say to you, ’Susie, I am certain that I love him,’ will you allow me to go to him, myself, quite alone, and ask him if he will have me for his wife?  That is what you did with Richard.  Tell me, Susie, will you allow me?”

“Yes, I will allow you.”

Bettina embraced her sister, and murmured these words in her ear: 

“Thank you, mamma.”

“Mamma, mamma!  It was thus that you used to call me when you were a child, when we were alone in the world together, when I used to undress you in our poor room in New York, when I held you in my arms, when I laid you in your little bed, when I sang you to sleep.  And since then, Bettina, I have had only one desire in the world, your happiness.  That is why I beg you to reflect well.  Do not answer me, do not let us talk any more of that.  I wish to leave you very calm, very tranquil.  You have sent away Annie, would you like me to be your little mamma again tonight, to undress you, and put you to bed as I used to do?”

“Yes, I should like it very much.”

“And when you are in bed, you promise me to be very good?”

“As good as an angel.”

“You will do your best to go to sleep?”

“My very best.”

“Very quietly, without thinking of anything?”

“Very quietly, without thinking of anything.”

“Very well, then.”

Ten minutes after, Bettina’s pretty head rested gently amid embroideries and lace.  Susie said to her sister: 

“I am going down to those people who bore me dreadfully this evening. 
Before going to my own room, I shall come back and see if you are asleep. 
Do not speak.  Go to sleep.”

She went away.  Bettina remained alone; she tried to keep her word; she endeavored to go to sleep, but only half-succeeded.  She fell into a half-slumber which left her floating between dream and reality.  She had promised to think of nothing, and yet she thought of him, always of him, of nothing but him, vaguely, confusedly.