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Monsieur de Lustrac, the Universal Amadis, hurried to Madame de Fischtaminel's, narrated this little scene with all the spirit at his command, and Madame de Fischtaminel put on an air something like Celimene's and said: "Poor creature, what an extremity she must be in!" I say nothing of Caroline's confusion, you have already divined it. Here is the second.
Induced by a desire the thousandth time expressed by Caroline, who complained that she had to go on foot or that she could not buy a new hat, a new parasol, a new dress, or any other article of dress, often enough: That she could not dress her baby as a sailor, as a lancer, as an artilleryman of the National Guard, as a Highlander with naked legs and a cap and feather, in a jacket, in a roundabout, in a velvet sack, in boots, in trousers: that she could not buy him toys enough, nor mechanical moving mice and Noah's Arks enough: That she could not return Madame Deschars or Madame de Fischtaminel their civilities, a ball, a party, a dinner: nor take a private box at the theatre, thus avoiding the necessity of sitting cheek by jowl with men who are either too polite or not enough so, and of calling a cab at the close of the performance; apropos of which she thus discourses: "You think it cheaper, but you are mistaken: men are all the same!
Besides, Monsieur de Fischtaminel is good looking for a man of thirty-six years; he received the cross of the Legion of Honor from Napoleon upon the field of battle, he is an ex-colonel, and had it not been for the Restoration, which put him upon half-pay, he would be a general. These are certainly extenuating circumstances.
You delivered me from all care on that point, and I thank heaven for it every day of my life." Madame de Fischtaminel has called to pay Madame Caroline a visit. She finds her coughing feebly and nearly bent double over her embroidery. "Ah, so you are working those slippers for your dear Adolphe?" Adolphe is standing before the fire-place as complacently as may be.
They overlook a good many things in her; there are some women who are the spoiled children of public opinion. As to Madame de Fischtaminel, who is, in fact, connected with the affair, as you shall see, she, being unable to recriminate, abstains from words and recriminates in acts.
You've been lying for the last hour, worse than a drummer." "Well, I'll say nothing more." "I know enough. I know all I wanted to know. You say you've seen lawyers, notaries, bankers: now you haven't seen one of them! Suppose I were to go to-morrow to see Madame de Fischtaminel, do you know what she would say?"
"Madame," Justine one day observes, "monsieur really does go out to see a woman." Caroline turns pale. "But don't be alarmed, madame, it's an old woman." "Ah, Justine, to some men no women are old: men are inexplicable." "But, madame, it isn't a lady, it's a woman, quite a common woman." "Ah, Justine, Lord Byron loved a fish-wife at Venice, Madame de Fischtaminel told me so."
He brings the elegant Madame Fischtaminel, a friend whose good graces you cultivate, your girdle for checking corpulency, bits of cosmetic for dyeing your moustache, old waistcoats discolored at the arm-holes, stockings slightly soiled at the heels and somewhat yellow at the toes. It is quite impossible to remark that these stains are caused by the leather!
You cannot suspect Caroline of the slightest inclination for Monsieur Deschars, a low, fat, red-faced man, formerly a notary, while you are in love with Madame de Fischtaminel! Then Caroline, the Caroline whose simplicity caused you such agony, Caroline who has become familiar with society, Caroline becomes acute and witty: you have two gadflies instead of one.
SECOND STYLE. Caroline, annoyed by the reputation of Madame Schinner, who is credited with the possession of epistolary talents, and styled the "Sevigne of the note", tired of hearing about Madame de Fischtaminel, who has ventured to write a little 32mo book on the education of the young, in which she has boldly reprinted Fenelon, without the style: Caroline has been working for six months upon a tale tenfold poorer than those of Berquin, nauseatingly moral, and flamboyant in style.
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