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Some day, when we are alone together, I will describe to you my Aunt Zephirine, Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoel, the Chevalier du Halga, the Demoiselles de Kergarouet, and others. Dear people! they ought to be preserved under glass. My mother-in-law has solemnly installed us in the apartments formerly occupied by herself and her late husband. The scene was touching. She said to us,
"Don't ask me what I think, dear; I cannot keep my eyes open when any one begins to read aloud." "I hope that Nais will not give us poetry often in the evenings," said Francis. "If I am obliged to attend while somebody reads aloud after dinner, it upsets my digestion." "Poor dearie," whispered Zephirine, "take a glass of eau sucree."
When all the players but one were anxious to continue an exciting game, the daring sailor, du Halga, one of those rich fellows prodigal of costs they do not pay, would offer ten counters to Mademoiselle Zephirine or Mademoiselle Jacqueline, when either of them, or both of them, had lost their five sous, on condition of reimbursement in case they won.
Mademoiselle Zephirine was therefore agreeably surprised to find in Fanny O'Brien a young woman born to the highest rank, to whom the petty cares of a poor household were extremely distasteful, one who, like other fine souls, would far have preferred to eat plain bread rather than the choicest food if she had to prepare it for herself; a woman capable of accomplishing all the duties, even the most painful, of humanity, strong under necessary privations, but without courage for commonplace avocations.
People of this sort are impressed by vociferation, as a coarse palate is ticked by strong spirits. During the interval, as they partook of ices, Zephirine despatched Francis to examine the volume, and informed her neighbor Amelie that the poetry was in print. Amelie brightened visibly. "Why, that is easily explained," said she. "M. de Rubempre works for a printer.
The viscountess lost one hundred sous by accumulated mouches, which so excited the cupidity of Zephirine that she regretted not being able to see the cards, and even spoke sharply to her sister-in-law, who acted as the proxy of her eyes. The party lasted till eleven o'clock. There were two defections, the baron and the chevalier, who went to sleep in their respective chairs.
"You little ninny!" whispered Camille, lightly touching his ear with a kiss that was full of friendship. "Quite true," thought Calyste to himself as the carriage drove away. "I am forgetting her advice but I shall always forget it, I'm afraid." Mademoiselle Zephirine had ordered the best wine to be brought from the cellar, and Mariotte had surpassed herself in her Breton dishes.
There were further charges and counter-charges as that the widow's Cochin-China cock had been found with its neck wrung; and that she, as sage femme, and the only one in Ambialet, had denied her services to Madame Champollion at a time when humanity should override all private squabbles. Brother Marc Antoine rubbed his hands and repeatedly smote Zephirine on the flank.
These pretty trifles, together with the trousseau which Zephirine had been preparing for the past twelve months, the godfather's jewels, and the usual wedding gifts, consoled Francoise and roused the curiosity of some mothers of daughters. Petit-Claud and Cointet had both remarked that their presence in the Angouleme Olympus was endured rather than courted.
"Come to breakfast to-morrow," said old Zephirine to her friend Jacqueline; "my brother will have had a talk with his son, and we can settle the matter finally. One nail, you know, drives out another." "Not among Bretons," said the chevalier.
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