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Updated: May 4, 2025
"Then was it you who betrayed him?" cried Aquilina, and with a hoarse sound in her throat like the growl of a tigress she rose to her feet; she seemed as if she would tear Castanier in pieces. "You know me too well to believe it," Castanier retorted. Aquilina was benumbed by his coolness. "Then how do you know it?" she murmured.
"Would you like to take my place?" inquired the Englishman. "Yes." "Very well, then; I will be at your house in a few moments." "By the by, Castanier, you are rather off your balance," Aquilina remarked. "There is some mischief brewing: you were quite melancholy and thoughtful all through the play. Do you want anything that I can give you, dear? Tell me."
She was a siren that can both kiss and devour; laugh like a devil, or weep as angels can. Dressed in red velvet, she trampled under her reckless feet the stray flowers fallen from other heads, and held out a salver to the two friends, with careless hands. The white arms stood out in bold relief against the velvet. "What is your name?" asked Raphael. "Aquilina."
Castanier, followed by the stranger, returned to his box; and in accordance with the order he had just received, he hastened to introduce Melmoth to Mme. de la Garde. Aquilina seemed to be not in the least surprised. The Englishman declined to take a seat in front, and Castanier was once more beside his mistress; the man's slightest wish must be obeyed.
Night threw dark shadows over this prolonged revelry, in which Raphael's narrative had been a second orgy of speech, of words without ideas, of ideas for which words had often been lacking. Towards noon, next day, the fair Aquilina bestirred herself. She yawned wearily. She had slept with her head upon a painted velvet footstool, and her cheeks were mottled over by contact with the surface.
It happened on account of Aquilina, the woman, you know. He was making up to a soldier's widow. She pleased the master; the master made friends with her himself, and Nicholas naturally, he was mad! He is rolling about drunk in the kitchen now. He is crying, and telling lies, saying he is sorry for the master " The examining magistrate ordered Nicholas to be brought.
His thoughts comprehended the whole world; he saw all the things of earth as if he had been raised to some high pinnacle above the world. Until that evening at the play he had loved Aquilina to distraction. Rather than give her up he would have shut his eyes to her infidelities; and now all that blind passion had passed away as a cloud vanishes in the sunlight.
And then the gulf yawns and gives up serried columns of figures marching four deep; when as a matter of fact they should have issued innocently three by three. Before Castanier had any idea of how much he had spent, he had arranged for Aquilina to have a carriage from a livery stable when she went out, instead of a cab.
Think of an old campaigner like me infatuated enough to tie myself to a petticoat tail!... Why take her? I must leave her behind. Yes, I could make up my mind to it; but I know myself I should be ass enough to go back for her. Still, nobody knows Aquilina. Shall I take her or leave her?" Protested. "You will not take her!" cried a voice that filled Castanier with sickening dread.
"And if you had not both feet on that fascinating Aquilina, whose heavy breathing suggests an analogy with the sounds of a storm about to burst," replied Emile, absently engaged in the harmless amusement of winding and unwinding Euphrasia's hair, "you would be ashamed of your inebriated garrulity. Both your systems can be packed in a phrase, and reduced to a single idea.
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