“Ah! so that is the reason why she asked whether Jacqueline might not stay with her when we go to Italy!  She wishes to court her by proxy.  But I don’t think she will succeed.  Monsieur de Cymier has the best chance.”

“Do you suppose the child suspects—­”

“That he admires her?  My dear friend, we have to do with a very sharp—­sighted young person.  Nothing escapes the observation of Mademoiselle ’votre fille’.”

And Madame de Nailles, in her turn, smiled somewhat bitterly.

“Well,” said Jacqueline’s father, after a few moments’ reflection, “it may be as well that she should weigh for and against a match before deciding.  She may spend several years that are difficult and dangerous trying to find out what she wants and to make up her mind.”

“Several years?”

“Hang it!  You would not marry off Jacqueline at once?”

“Bah! many a girl, practically not as old as she, is married at sixteen or seventeen.”

“Why!  I fancied you thought so differently!”

“Our ways of thinking are sometimes altered by events, especially when they are founded upon sincere and disinterested affection.”

“Like that of good parents, such as we are,” added M. de Nailles, ending her sentence with an expression of grateful emotion.

For one moment the Baronne paled under this compliment.

“What did you say to Madame d’Argy?” she hastened to ask.

“I said we must give the young fellow’s beard time to grow.”

“Yes, that was right.  I prefer Monsieur de Cymier a hundred times over.  Still, if nothing better offers—­a bird in the hand, you know—­”

Madame de Nailles finished her sentence by a wave of her fan.

“Oh! our bird in the hand is not to be despised.  A very handsome estate—­”

“Where Jacqueline would be bored to death.  I should rather see her radiant at some foreign court.  Let me manage it.  Let me bring her out.  Give me carte blanche and let me have some society this winter.”

Madame de Nailles, whether she knew it or not—­probably she did, for she had great skill in reading the thoughts of others—­was acting precisely in accordance with the wishes or the will of Jacqueline, who, having found much enjoyment in the dances at the Casino, had made up her mind that she meant to come out into society before any of her young companions.

“I shall not have to beg and implore her,” she said to herself, anticipating the objections of her stepmother.  “I shall only have politely to let her suspect that such a thing may have occurred as having had a listener at a door.  I paid dearly enough for this hold over her.  I have no scruple in using it.”