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Updated: June 4, 2025
"What are they?" "Singleness of mind and purity," replied Madame de la Chanterie. "Your ignorance shows that you have neglected the reading of our book." she added, laughing at the innocent trick she had played to know if Godefroid had read the "Imitation of Jesus Christ." "And, lastly," she went on, "fill your soul with Saint Paul's epistle upon Charity.
Concise, abbreviated narratives are to some minds texts into the hidden meaning of which they love to burrow. In the middle of the night, aided by the silence, by the darkness, by the terrible relation intimated by the worthy Alain between the facts of that document and Madame de la Chanterie, Godefroid applied all the forces of his intellect to decipher the dreadful theme.
To-morrow, if you come to me, I will finish telling you all that relates to Madame de la Chanterie; for you will then know the general facts so thoroughly that I can end the whole story in a few words."
"The fish gets away more than once before it is caught," said Monsieur Alain, laughing. The perfect indifference of Madame de la Chanterie on hearing of the immediate ingratitude of persons to whom she had, no doubt, given money, surprised Godefroid, who became thoughtful.
At that instant Madame de la Chanterie appeared like a spectre at the door of her room, against the frame of which she supported herself. "In the name of Louis XVI. and Marie-Antoinette whom I see on their scaffold, in the name of Madame Elisabeth, in the name of my daughter and of yours, and for Jesus' sake, I forgive you." Hearing those words the old man raised his head.
They all seemed, even the priest, in spite of the sacred character his functions gave him, to regard her as a queen. Godefroid also noticed their sobriety. Each seemed to eat only for nourishment. Madame de la Chanterie took, as did the rest, a single peach and half a bunch of grapes; but she told her new lodger, as she offered him the various dishes, not to imitate such temperance.
"That devoted creature, condemned to twelve years' imprisonment, gave herself up that she might take care of Madame de la Chanterie, and wait upon her. Our dear vicar was the priest at Mortagne who gave the last sacraments to the Baronne des Tours-Minieres; he had the courage to go with her to the scaffold, and to him she gave her farewell kiss.
He was fortunate enough to do so, and had a long talk with a young clerk on books of jurisprudence. When he reached the rue Chanoinesse, he found Madame de la Chanterie and her friends just returning from high mass; in reply to the look she gave him Godefroid made her a significant sign with his head. "Isn't our dear father Alain here to-day?" he said.
Madame de la Chanterie now wore gray silk stockings and small prunella shoes; her gown was the same as before, but she was wrapped in a Venetian "mantua," a sort of cloak which was just then returning into fashion. On her head was a drawn bonnet of green silk, lined with white silk, of a style called a la bonne femme. Her face was framed by a cloud of lace.
"Madame la Baronne de la Chanterie," replied the banker, "is one of the most obscure persons in Paris, but she is also one of the most honorable. Have you any object in asking for information?" Godefroid retreated into generalities: he was going to live among strangers; he naturally wished to know something of those with whom he should be intimately thrown.
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