C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
The Most Beautiful Woman in Paris
By Ludovic Halévy (1834–1908)
O
“That blonde! oh, that blonde! she is ideal! Look at that blonde! Do you know that blonde?”
It was from the front part of Madame de Marizy’s large first-tier box that all these exclamations were coming at that moment.
“Which blonde?” asked Madame de Marizy.
“Which blonde! Why, there is but one this evening in the house. Opposite to you, over there in the first box, the Sainte Mesmes’ box. Look, baroness, look straight over there.”
“Yes, I am looking at her. She is atrociously got up, but pretty.”
“Pretty! She is a wonder! simply a wonder! Got up? Yes, agreed—some country relative. The Sainte Mesmes have cousins in Périgord. But what a smile! How well her neck is set on! And the slope of the shoulders! ah, especially the shoulders!”
“Come, either keep still or go away. Let me listen to Madame Caron.”
The prince went away, as no one knew that incomparable blonde. Yet she had often been to the opera, but in an unpretentious way—in the second tier of boxes. And to Prince Agénor, above the first tier of boxes there was nothing, absolutely nothing. There was emptiness—space. The prince had never been in a second-tier box, so the second-tier boxes did not exist.
While Madame Caron was marvelously singing the marvelous phrase of Reyer, “Ô mon sauveur silencieux, la Valkyrie est ta conquête,” the prince strolled along the passages of the opera. Who was that blonde? He wanted to know, and he would know.
And suddenly he remembered that good Madame Picard was the box-opener of the Sainte Mesmes, and that he, Prince of Nérins, had had the honor of being for a long time a friend of that good Madame Picard….
“Ah, prince,” said Madame Picard on seeing Agénor, “there is no one for you to-night in my boxes. Madame de Simiane is not here, and Madame de Sainte Mesme has rented her box.”
“That’s precisely it. Don’t you know the people in Madame de Sainte Mesme’s box?”
“Not at all, prince. It’s the first time I have seen them in the marquise’s box.”
“Then you have no idea—”
“None, prince. Only to me they don’t appear to be people of—”
She was going to say of our set. A box-opener of the first tier of boxes at the opera, having generally only to do with absolutely high-born people, considers herself as being a little of their set, and shows extreme disdain for unimportant people; it displeases her to receive these unimportant people in her boxes. Madame Picard however had tact which rarely forsook her, and so stopped herself in time to say:—
“People of your set. They belong to the middle class, to the wealthy middle class; but still the middle class. That doesn’t satisfy you; you wish to know more on account of the blonde. Is it not so, prince?”
Those last words were spoken with rare delicacy; they were murmured more than spoken—box-opener to prince! It would have been unacceptable without that perfect reserve in accent and tone; yes, it was a box-opener who spoke, but a box-opener who was a little bit the aunt of former times, the aunt à la mode de Cythère. Madame Picard continued:—
“Ah, she is a beauty! She came with a little dark man—her husband, I’m sure; for while she was taking off her cloak—it always takes some time—he didn’t say a word to her: no eagerness, no little attentions—yes, he could only be a husband. I examined the cloak: people one doesn’t know puzzle me and my colleague; Madame Flachet and I always amuse ourselves by trying to guess from appearances. Well, the cloak comes from a good dressmaker, but not from a great one; it is fine and well made, but it has no style. I think they are middle-class people, prince. But how stupid I am! You know M. Palmer—well, a little while ago he came to see the beautiful blonde!”
“M. Palmer?”
“Yes, and he can tell you.”
“Thanks, Madame Picard, thanks.”
“Good-by, prince, good-by,” and Madame Picard went back to her stool, near her colleague Madame Flachet, and said to her:
“Ah, my dear, what a charming man the prince is! True gentlefolks, there is nothing like them! But they are dying out, they are dying out; there are many less than formerly.”
Prince Agénor was willing to do Palmer—big Palmer, rich Palmer, vain Palmer—the honor of being one of his friends; he deigned, and very frequently, to confide to Palmer his financial difficulties, and the banker was delighted to come to his aid. The prince had been obliged to resign himself to becoming a member of two boards of directors presided over by Palmer, who was much pleased at having under obligations to him the representative of one of the noblest families in France. Besides, the prince proved himself to be a good prince, and publicly acknowledged Palmer, showing himself in his box, taking charge of his entertainments, and occupying himself with his racing stable. He had even pushed his gratitude to the point of compromising Madame Palmer in the most showy way.
“I am removing her from the middle class,” he said; “I owe it to Palmer, who is one of the best fellows in the world.”
The prince found the banker alone in a lower box.
“What is the name—the name of that blonde in the Sainte Mesmes’ box?”
“Madame Derline.”
“Is there a M. Derline?”
“Certainly; a lawyer—my lawyer, the Sainte Mesmes’ lawyer. And if you want to see Madame Derline close to, come to my ball next Thursday. She will be there.”
The wife of a lawyer! she was only the wife of a lawyer! The prince sat down in the front of the box opposite Madame Derline, and while looking at that lawyeress he was thinking. “Have I,” he said to himself, “sufficient credit, sufficient power, to make of Madame Derline the most beautiful woman in Paris?”
For there was always a most beautiful woman in Paris, and it was he, Prince Agénor, who flattered himself that he could discover, proclaim, crown, and consecrate that most beautiful woman in Paris. Launch Madame Derline in society! Why not? He had never launched any one from the middle class. The enterprise would be new, amusing, and bold. He looked at Madame Derline through his opera-glass, and discovered thousands of beauties and perfections in her delightful face.
After the opera, the prince, during the exit, placed himself at the bottom of the great staircase. He had enlisted two of his friends. “Come,” he had said to them, “I will show you the most beautiful woman in Paris.” While he was speaking, two steps away from the prince was an alert young man who was attached to a morning paper, a very widely read paper. The young man had sharp ears; he caught on the fly the phrase of the Prince Agénor, whose high social position he knew; he succeeded in keeping close to the prince, and when Madame Derline passed, the young reporter had the luck of hearing the conversation, without losing a word, of the three brilliant noblemen. A quarter of an hour later he arrived at the office of the paper.
“Is there time,” he asked, “to write a dozen lines in the Society Notebook?”
“Yes, but hurry.”
The young man was a quick writer; the fifteen lines were done in the twinkling of an eye. They brought seven francs fifty to the reporter, but cost M. Derline a little more than that.
During this time Prince Agénor, seated in the club at the whist table, was saying, while shuffling the cards:—
“This evening at the opera there was a marvelous woman, a certain Madame Derline. She is the most beautiful woman in Paris!”
The following morning, in the gossip-corner of the Bois, in the spring sunshine, the prince, surrounded by a little group of respectful disciples, was solemnly delivering from the back of his roan mare the following opinion:—
“Listen well to what I say. The most beautiful woman in Paris is a certain Madame Derline. This star will be visible Thursday evening at the Palmers’. Go, and don’t forget the name—Madame Derline.”
The disciples dispersed, and went abroad spreading the great news.
Madame Derline had been admirably brought up by an irreproachable mother; she had been taught that she ought to get up in the morning, keep a strict account of her expenses, not go to a great dressmaker, believe in God, love her husband, visit the poor, and never spend but half her income, in order to prepare dowries for her daughters. Madame Derline performed all these duties. She led a peaceful and serene life in the old house (in the Rue Dragon) which had sheltered, since 1825, three generations of Derlines; the husbands had all three been lawyers, the wives had all three been virtuous. The three generations had passed there a happy and moderate life, never having any great pleasures, but also never being very much bored.
The next day Madame Derline awoke at eight o’clock in the morning with an uneasy feeling. She had passed a troubled night—she, who usually slept like a child. The evening before, in the box at the opera, Madame Derline had vaguely felt that something was going on around her. And during the entire last act, an opera-glass obstinately fixed on her—the prince’s opera-glass—had thrown her into a certain agitation, though not a disagreeable one. She had worn a low dress—too low, in her mother’s opinion; and two or three times, under the fixity of that opera-glass, she had raised the shoulder-straps of her dress.
So, after opening her eyes, Madame Derline re-closed them lazily, indolently, with thoughts floating between dreamland and reality. She again saw the opera-house, and a hundred, two hundred, five hundred opera-glasses obstinately fixed on her—on her alone.
The maid entered, placed a tray on a little table, made up a big fire in the fireplace, and went away. There was a cup of chocolate and the morning paper on the tray, the same as every morning. Then Madame Derline courageously got up, slipped her little bare feet into fur slippers, wrapped herself in a white cashmere dressing-gown, and crouched shivering in an arm-chair by the fire. She sipped the chocolate, and slightly burned herself; she must wait a little while. She put down the cup, took up the paper, unfolded it, and rapidly ran her eye over the six columns of the front page. At the bottom, quite at the bottom of the sixth column, were the following lines:—
To read the name of the baroness it was necessary to turn the page. Madame Derline did not turn it; she was thinking, reflecting. The evening before, she had amused herself by having Palmer point out to her the social leaders in the house, and it so happened that the banker had pointed out to her the marvelous marquise. And Madame Derline—who was twenty-two—raised herself a little to look in the glass. She exchanged a slight smile with a young blonde, who was very pink-and-white.
“Ah,” she said to herself, “if I were a marquise the man who wrote this would perhaps have paid some attention to me, and my name would perhaps be there. I wonder if it’s fun to see one’s name printed in a paper?”
And while addressing this question to herself, she turned the page, and continued reading:—
Her name! She had read her name! She was dazzled. Her eyes clouded. All the letters in the alphabet began to dance wildly on the paper. Then they calmed down, stopped, and regained their places. She was able to find her name, and continue reading:—
A single paragraph, and that was all. It was enough,—it was too much! Madame Derline was seized with a feeling of indefinable confusion. It was a combination of fear and pleasure, of joy and trouble, of satisfied vanity and wounded modesty. Her dressing-gown was a little open; she folded it over with a sort of violence, and crossed it upon her feet, abruptly drawn back towards the arm-chair. She had a feeling of nudity. It seemed to her that all Paris was there in her room, and that the Prince de Nérins was in front saying to all Paris, “Look, look! She is the most beautiful woman in Paris!”
The Prince of Nérins! She knew the name well, for she read with keen interest in the papers all the articles entitled ‘Parisian Life,’ ‘High Life,’ ‘Society Echoes,’ etc.; and all the society columns signed “Mousseline,” “Fanfreluche,” “Brimborion,” “Véloutine”; all the accounts of great marriages, great balls, of great comings-out, and of great charity sales. The name of the prince often figured in these articles, and he was always quoted as supreme arbiter of Parisian elegances.
And it was he who had declared—ah! decidedly pleasure got the better of fear. Still trembling with emotion, Madame Derline went and placed herself before a long looking-glass, an old cheval-glass from Jacob’s, which never till now had reflected other than good middle-class women married to good lawyers. In that glass she looked at herself, examined herself, studied herself,—long, curiously, and eagerly. Of course she knew she was pretty, but oh, the power of print! she found herself absolutely delightful. She was no longer Madame Derline; she was the most beautiful woman in Paris! Her feet, her little feet—their bareness no longer troubled her—left the ground. She raised herself gently towards the heavens, towards the clouds, and felt herself become a goddess.
But suddenly an anxiety seized her. “Edward! what would Edward say?” Edward was her husband. There had been but one man’s surname in her life—her husband’s. The lawyer was well loved! And almost at the same moment when she was asking herself what Edward would say, Edward abruptly opened the door.
He was a little out of breath. He had run up-stairs two at a time. He was peacefully rummaging among old papers in his study on the ground-floor when one of his brother lawyers—with forced congratulations, however,—had made him read the famous article. He had soon got rid of his brother lawyer, and he had come, much irritated, to his room. At first there was simply a torrent of words.
“Why do these journalists meddle? It’s an outrage! Your name—look, there is your name in this paper!”
“Yes, I know, I’ve seen—”
“Ah, you know, you have seen—and you think it quite natural!”
“But, dear—”
“What times do we live in? It’s your fault, too.”
“My fault!”
“Yes, your fault!”
“And how?”
“Your dress last night was too low, much too low. Besides, your mother told you so—”
“Oh, mamma—”
“You needn’t say ‘Oh, mamma!’ Your mother was right. There, read: ‘And whose shoulders—ah, what shoulders!’ And it is of your shoulders they are speaking. And that prince who dares to award you a prize for beauty!”
The good man had plebeian, Gothic ideas—the ideas of a lawyer of old times, of a lawyer of the Rue Dragon; the lawyers of the Boulevard Malesherbes are no longer like that.
Madame Derline very gently, very quietly, brought the rebel back to reason. Of course there was charm and eloquence in her speech, but how much more charm and eloquence in the tenderness of her glance and smile!
Why this great rage and despair? He was accused of being the husband of the most beautiful woman in Paris. Was that such a horrible thing, such a terrible misfortune? And who was the brother lawyer, the good brother lawyer, who had taken pleasure in coming to show him the hateful article?
“M. Renaud.”
“Oh, it was M. Renaud—dear M. Renaud!”
Thereupon Madame Derline was seized with a hearty fit of laughter; so much so that the blond hair, which had been loosely done up, came down and framed the pretty face from which gleamed the dark eyes, which could also, when they gave themselves the trouble, look very gentle, very caressing, very loving.
“Oh, it was M. Renaud, the husband of that delightful Madame Renaud! Well, do you know what you will do immediately, without losing a minute? Go to the president of the Tribunal and ask for a divorce. You will say to him: ‘M. Aubépin, deliver me from my wife. Her crime is being pretty, very pretty, too pretty. I wish another one who is ugly, very ugly, who has Madame Renaud’s large nose, colossal foot, pointed chin, skinny shoulders, and eternal pimples.’ That’s what you want, isn’t it? Come, you big stupid, kiss your poor wife, and forgive her for not being a monster.”
As rather lively gestures had illustrated this little speech, the white cashmere dressing-gown had slipped—slipped a good deal, and had opened, very much opened; the criminal shoulders were within reach of M. Derline’s lips—he succumbed. Besides, he too felt the abominable influence of the press. His wife had never seemed so pretty to him; and brought back to subjection, M. Derline returned to his study in order to make money for the most beautiful woman in Paris.
A very wise and opportune occupation; for scarcely was Madame Derline left alone when an idea flashed through her head which was to call forth a very pretty collection of bank-notes from the cash-box of the lawyer of the Rue Dragon. Madame Derline had intended wearing to the Palmers’ ball a dress which had already been much seen. Madame Derline had kept the dressmaker of her wedding dress, her mother’s dressmaker, a dressmaker of the Left Bank. It seemed to her that her new position imposed new duties on her. She could not appear at the Palmers’ without a dress which had not been seen, and one stamped with a well-known name. She ordered the carriage in the afternoon, and resolutely gave her coachman the address of one of the most illustrious dressmakers in Paris. She arrived a little agitated, and to reach the great artist was obliged to pass through a veritable crowd of footmen, who were in the antechamber chatting and laughing, used to meeting there and making long stops. Nearly all the footmen were those of society, the highest society; they had spent the previous evening together at the English Embassy, and were to be that evening at the Duchess of Grémoille’s.
Madame Derline entered a sumptuous parlor; it was very sumptuous, too sumptuous. Twenty great customers were there,—society women and actresses, all agitated, anxious, feverish,—looking at the beautiful tall saleswomen come and go before them, wearing the last creations of the master of the house. The great artist had a diplomatic bearing: buttoned-up black frock-coat, long cravat with pin (a present from a Royal Highness who paid her bills slowly), and a many-colored rosette in his buttonhole (the gift of a small reigning prince who paid slower yet the bills of an opera-dancer). He came and went—precise, calm, and cool—in the midst of the solicitations and supplications of his customers. “M. Arthur! M. Arthur!” One heard nothing but that phrase; he was M. Arthur. He went from one to the other—respectful without too much humility to the duchesses, and easy without too much familiarity to the actresses. There was an extraordinary liveliness, and a confusion of marvelous velvets, satins, and embroidered, brocaded, and gold- or silver-threaded stuffs, all thrown here and there as though by accident—but what science in that accident!—on arm-chairs, tables, and divans.
In the first place Madame Derline ran against a shop-girl who was bearing with outstretched arms a white dress, and was almost hidden beneath a light mountain of muslins and laces. The only thing visible was the shop-girl’s mussed black hair and sly suburban expression. Madame Derline backed away, wishing to place herself against the wall; but a tryer-on was there, a large energetic brunette, who spoke authoritatively in a high staccato. “At once,” she was saying, “bring me at once the princess’s dress!”
Frightened and dazed, Madame Derline stood in a corner and watched an opportunity to seize a saleswoman on the fly. She even thought of giving up the game. Never, certainly, should she dare to address directly that terrible M. Arthur, who had just given her a rapid glance in which she believed to have read, “Who is she? She isn’t properly dressed! She doesn’t go to a fashionable dressmaker!” At last Madame Derline succeeded in getting hold of a disengaged saleswoman, and there was the same slightly disdainful glance—a glance which was accompanied by the phrase—
“Madame is not a regular customer of the house?”
“No, I am not a customer—”
“And you wish?”
“A dress, a ball-dress, and I want the dress for next Thursday evening—”
“Thursday next?”
“Yes, Thursday next.”
“O madame, it is not to be thought of! Even for a customer of the house it would be impossible.”
“But I wished it so much—”
“Go and see M. Arthur. He alone can—”
“And where is M. Arthur?”
“In his office. He has just gone into his office. Over there, madame, opposite.”
Madame Derline, through a half-open door, saw a sombre and severe but luxurious room—an ambassador’s office. On the walls the great European powers were represented by photographs—the Empress Eugénie, the Princess of Wales, a grand-duchess of Russia, and an archduchess of Austria. M. Arthur was there taking a few moments’ rest, seated in a large arm-chair, with an air of lassitude and exhaustion, and with a newspaper spread out over his knees. He arose on seeing Madame Derline enter. In a trembling voice she repeated her wish.
“O madame, a ball-dress—a beautiful ball-dress—for Thursday! I couldn’t make such a promise; I couldn’t keep it. There are responsibilities to which I never expose myself.”
He spoke slowly, gravely, as a man conscious of his high position.
“Oh, I am so disappointed. It was a particular occasion, and I was told that you alone could—”
Two tears, two little tears, glittered on her eyelashes. M. Arthur was moved. A woman, a pretty woman, crying there before him! Never had such homage been paid to his genius.
“Well, madame, I am willing to make an attempt. A very simple dress—”
“Oh no, not simple. Very brilliant, on the contrary—everything that is most brilliant. Two of my friends are customers of yours” (she named them), “and I am Madame Derline—”
“Madame Derline! you are Madame Derline?”
The two Madame Derlines were followed by a glance and a smile—the glance was at the newspaper and the smile was at Madame Derline; but it was a discreet, self-contained smile, the smile of a perfectly gallant man. This is what the glance and smile said with admirable clearness:—
“Ah! you are Madame Derline, that already celebrated Madame Derline, who yesterday at the opera—I understand, I understand—I was reading just now in this paper: words are no longer necessary; you should have told your name at once. Yes, you need me; yes, you shall have your dress; yes, I want to divide your success with you.”
M. Arthur called:—
“Mademoiselle Blanche, come here at once! Mademoiselle Blanche!”
And turning towards Madame Derline, he said:—
“She has great talent, but I shall myself superintend it; so be easy—yes, I myself.”
Madame Derline was a little confused, a little embarrassed by her glory, but happy nevertheless. Mademoiselle Blanche came forward.
“Conduct madame,” said M. Arthur, “and take the necessary measures for a ball-dress, very low, and with absolutely bare arms. During that time, madame, I am going to think seriously of what I can do for you. It must be something entirely new—ah! before going, permit me—”
He walked very slowly around Madame Derline, and examined her with profound attention; then he walked away, and considered her from a little distance. His face was serious, thoughtful, and anxious: a great thinker wrestling with a great problem. He passed his hand over his forehead, raised his eyes to the sky, getting inspiration by a painful delivery; but suddenly his face lit up—the spirit from above had answered.
“Go, madame,” he said, “go. Your dress is thought out. When you come back, mademoiselle, bring me that piece of pink satin; you know, the one that I was keeping for some great occasion.”
Thus Madame Derline found herself with Mademoiselle Blanche in a trying-on room, which was a sort of little cabin lined with mirrors. A quarter of an hour later, when the measures had been taken, Madame Derline came back and discovered M. Arthur in the midst of pieces of satin of all colors, of crêpes, of tulles, of laces, and of brocaded stuffs.
“No, no, not the pink satin,” he said to Mademoiselle Blanche, who was bringing the asked-for piece; “no, I have found something better. Listen to me. This is what I wish; I have given up the pink, and I have decided on this, this peach-colored satin: a classic robe, outlining all the fine lines and showing the suppleness of the body. This robe must be very clinging—hardly any underskirts. It must be of surah. Madame must be melted into it—do you thoroughly understand?—absolutely melted into the robe. We will drop over the dress this crêpe—yes, that one, but in small, light pleats. The crêpe will be as a cloud thrown over the dress—a transparent, vapory, impalpable cloud. The arms are to be absolutely bare, as I already told you. On each shoulder there must be a simple knot, showing the upper part of the arm. Of what is the knot to be? I’m still undecided; I need to think it over—till to-morrow, madame, till to-morrow.”
Madame Derline came back the next day, and the next, and every day till the day before the famous Thursday; and each time that she came back, while awaiting her turn to try on, she ordered dresses, very simple ones, but yet costing from seven to eight hundred francs each.
And that was not all. On the day of her first visit to M. Arthur, when Madame Derline came out of the great house she was broken-hearted—positively broken-hearted—at the sight of her brougham: it really did make a pitiful appearance among all the stylish carriages which were waiting in three rows and taking up half the street. It was the brougham of her late mother-in-law, and it still rolled through the streets of Paris after fifteen years’ service. Madame Derline got into the woe-begone brougham to drive straight to a very well-known carriage-maker, and that evening, cleverly seizing the psychological moment, she explained to M. Derline that she had seen a certain little black coupé lined with blue satin that would frame delightfully her new dresses.
The coupé was bought the next day by M. Derline, who also was beginning fully to realize the extent of his new duties. But the next day it was discovered that it was impossible to harness to that jewel of a coupe the old horse who had pulled the old carriage, and no less impossible to put on the box the old coachman who drove the old horse.
This is how on Thursday, April 25th, at half-past ten in the evening, a very pretty chestnut mare, driven by a very correct English coachman, took M. and Madame Derline to the Palmers’. They still lacked something—a little groom to sit beside the English coachman. But a certain amount of discretion had to be employed. The most beautiful woman in Paris intended to wait ten days before asking for the little groom.
While she was going up-stairs at the Palmers’, she distinctly felt her heart beat like the strokes of a hammer. She was going to play a decisive game. She knew that the Palmers had been going everywhere, saying, “Come on Thursday: we will show you Madame Derline, the most beautiful woman in Paris.” Curiosity as well as jealousy had been well awakened.
She entered, and from the first minute she had the delicious sensation of her success. Throughout the long gallery of the Palmers’ house it was a true triumphal march. She advanced with firm and precise step, erect, and head well held. She appeared to see nothing, to hear nothing, but how well she saw! how well she felt the fire of all those eyes on her shoulders! Around her arose a little murmur of admiration, and never had music been sweeter to her.
Yes, decidedly, all went well. She was on a fair way to conquer Paris. And, sure of herself, at each step she became more confident, lighter, and bolder, as she advanced on the arm of Palmer, who in passing pointed out the counts, the marquises, and the dukes. And then Palmer suddenly said to her:—
“I want to present to you one of your greatest admirers, who the other night at the opera spoke of nothing but your beauty; he is the Prince of Nérins.”
She became as red as a cherry. Palmer looked at her and began to laugh.
“Ah, you read the other day in that paper—?”
“I read—yes, I read—”
“But where is the prince, where is he? I saw him during the day, and he was to be here early.”
Madame Derline was not to see the Prince of Nérins that evening. And yet he had intended to go to the Palmers’ and preside at the deification of his lawyeress. He had dined at the club, and had allowed himself to be dragged off to a first performance at a minor theatre. An operetta of the regulation type was being played. The principal personage was a young queen, who was always escorted by the customary four maids of honor.
Three of these young ladies were very well known to first-nighters, as having already figured in the tableaux of operettas and in groups of fairies, but the fourth—oh, the fourth! She was a new one, a tall brunette of the most striking beauty. The prince made himself remarked more than all others by his enthusiasm. He completely forgot that he was to leave after the first act. The play was over very late, and the prince was still there, having paid no attention to the piece or the music, having seen nothing but the wonderful brunette, having heard nothing but the stanza which she had unworthily massacred in the middle of the second act. And while they were leaving the theatre, the prince was saying to whoever would listen:—
“That brunette! oh, that brunette! She hasn’t an equal in any theatre! She is the most beautiful woman in Paris! the most beautiful!”
It was one o’clock in the morning. The prince asked himself if he should go to the Palmers’. Poor Madame Derline: she was of very slight importance beside this new wonder! And then, too, the prince was a methodical man. The hour for whist had arrived; so he departed to play whist.
The following morning Madame Derline found ten lines on the Palmers’ ball in the “society column.” There was mention of the marquises, the countesses, and the duchesses who were there, but about Madame Derline there was not a word—not a word.
On the other hand, the writer of theatrical gossip celebrated in enthusiastic terms the beauty of that ideal maid of honor, and said, “Besides, the Prince of Nérins declared that Mademoiselle Miranda was indisputably the most beautiful woman in Paris!”
Madame Derline threw the paper into the fire. She did not wish her husband to know that she was already not the most beautiful woman in Paris.
She has however kept the great dressmaker and the English coachman, but she has never dared to ask for the little groom.