Esmeralda | Page 6

round; but I told him I knew
you wouldn't for you wasn't that kind."
"I find him," said Clélie to me, "inexpressibly mournful,--even though

he excites one to smile? upon all occasions. Is it not mournful that his
very suffering should be absurd. Mon Dieu! he does not wear his
clothes--he bears them about with him--he simply carries them."
It was about this time that Mademoiselle Esmeralda was rendered
doubly unhappy. Since their residence in Paris Madame had been
industriously occupied in making efforts to enter society. She had
struggled violently and indefatigably. She was at once persistent and
ambitious. She had used every means that lay in her power, and, most
of all, she had used her money. Naturally, she had found people upon
the outskirts of good circles who would accept her with her money.
Consequently, she had obtained acquaintances of a class, and was bold
enough to employ them as stepping-stones. At all events, she began to
receive invitations, and to discover opportunities to pay visits, and to
take her daughter with her. Accordingly, Mademoiselle Esmeralda was
placed upon exhibition.
She was dressed by experienced artistes. She was forced from her
seclusion, and obliged to drive, and call, and promenade.
Her condition was pitiable. While all this was torture to her
inexperience and timidity, her fear of her mother rendered her wholly
submissive. Each day brought with it some new trial. She was admired
for many reasons,--by some for her wealth, of which all had heard
rumors; by others for her freshness and beauty. The silence and
sensitiveness which arose from shyness, and her ignorance of all social
rules, were called naïveté and modesty, and people who abhorred her
mother, not unfrequently were charmed with her, and consequently
Madame found her also an instrument of some consequence.
In her determination to overcome all obstacles, Madame even
condescended to apply to my wife, whose influence over Mademoiselle
she was clever enough not to undervalue.
"I want you to talk to Mademoiselle," she said. "She thinks a great deal
of you, and I want you to give her some good advice. You know what
society is, and you know that she ought to be proud of her advantages,
and not make a fool of herself. Many a girl would be glad enough of

what she has before her. She's got money, and she's got chances, and I
don't begrudge her anything. She can spend all she likes on clothes and
things, and I'll take her anywhere if she'll behave herself. They wear me
out--her and her father. It's her father that's ruined her, and her living as
she's done. Her father never knew anything, and he's made a pet of her,
and got her into his way of thinking. It's ridiculous how little ambition
they have, and she might marry as well as any girl. There's a marquis
that's quite in love with her at this moment, and she's as afraid of him
as death, and cries if I even mention him, though he's a nice enough
man, if he is a bit elderly. Now, I want you to reason with her."
This Clélie told me afterward.
"And upon going away," she ended, "she turned round toward me,
setting her face into an indescribable expression of hardness and
obstinacy. 'I want her to understand,' she said, 'that she's cut off forever
from anything that's happened before. There's the' Atlantic Ocean and
many a mile of land between her and North Carolina, and so she may as
well give that up.'"
Two or three days after this Mademoiselle came to our apartment in
great grief. She had left Madame in a violent ill-temper. They had
received invitations to a ball at which they were to meet the marquis.
Madame had been elated, and the discovery of Mademoiselle's misery
and trepidation had roused her indignation. There had been a painful
scene, and Mademoiselle had been overwhelmed as usual.
She knelt before the fire and wept despairingly.
"I'd rather die than go," she said. "I can't stand it. I can't get used to it.
The light, and the noise, and the talk, hurts me, and I don't know what I
am doing. And people stare at me, and I make mistakes, and I'm not fit
for it--and--and--I'd rather be dead fifty thousand times than let that
man come near me. I hate him, and I'm afraid of him, and I wish I was
dead."
At this juncture came the timid summons upon the door, and the father
entered with a disturbed and subdued air. He did not conceal his hat,

but held it in his hands, and turned it round and round in an agitated
manner as he seated himself beside his daughter.
"Esmeraldy," he said, "don't you take it so hard; honey. Mother, she's