Fromont and Risler, vol 2 | Page 4

to sample the author's ideas before making
an entire meal of them. D.W.]

FROMONT AND RISLER
By ALPHONSE DAUDET

BOOK 2.

CHAPTER VII
THE TRUE PEARL AND THE FALSE
"What can be the matter? What have I done to her?" Claire Fromont
very often wondered when she thought of Sidonie.
She was entirely ignorant of what had formerly taken place between her
friend and Georges at Savigny. Her own life was so upright, her mind
so pure, that it was impossible for her to divine the jealous,
mean-spirited ambition that had grown up by her side within the past
fifteen years. And yet the enigmatical expression in that pretty face as it
smiled upon her gave her a vague feeling of uneasiness which she
could not understand. An affectation of politeness, strange enough
between friends, was suddenly succeeded by an ill-dissembled anger, a
cold, stinging tone, in presence of which Claire was as perplexed as by
a difficult problem. Sometimes, too, a singular presentiment, the ill-
defined intuition of a great misfortune, was mingled with her
uneasiness; for all women have in some degree a kind of second sight,
and, even in the most innocent, ignorance of evil is suddenly illumined
by visions of extraordinary lucidity.
From time to time, as the result of a conversation somewhat longer than
usual, or of one of those unexpected meetings when faces taken by
surprise allow their real thoughts to be seen, Madame Fromont
reflected seriously concerning this strange little Sidonie; but the active,
urgent duties of life, with its accompaniment of affections and
preoccupations, left her no time for dwelling upon such trifles.
To all women comes a time when they encounter such sudden windings
in the road that their whole horizon changes and all their points of view
become transformed.
Had Claire been a young girl, the falling away of that friendship bit by
bit, as if torn from her by an unkindly hand, would have been a source
of great regret to her. But she had lost her father, the object of her
greatest, her only youthful affection; then she had married. The child

had come, with its thrice welcome demands upon her every moment.
Moreover, she had with her her mother, almost in her dotage, still
stupefied by her husband's tragic death. In a life so fully occupied,
Sidonie's caprices received but little attention; and it had hardly
occurred to Claire Fromont to be surprised at her marriage to Risler. He
was clearly too old for her; but, after all, what difference did it make, if
they loved each other?
As for being vexed because little Chebe had attained that lofty position,
had become almost her equal, her superior nature was incapable of such
pettiness. On the contrary, she would have been glad with all her heart
to know that that young wife, whose home was so near her own, who
lived the same life, so to speak, and had been her playmate in
childhood, was happy and highly esteemed. Being most kindly
disposed toward her, she tried to teach her, to instruct her in the ways
of society, as one might instruct an attractive provincial, who fell but
little short of being altogether charming.
Advice is not readily accepted by one pretty young woman from
another. When Madame Fromont gave a grand dinner-party, she took
Madame Risler to her bedroom, and said to her, smiling frankly in
order not to vex her: "You have put on too many jewels, my dear. And
then, you know, with a high dress one doesn't wear flowers in the hair."
Sidonie blushed, and thanked her friend, but wrote down an additional
grievance against her in the bottom of her heart.
In Claire's circle her welcome was decidedly cold. The Faubourg Saint-
Germain has its pretensions; but do not imagine that the Marais has
none! Those wives and daughters of mechanics, of wealthy
manufacturers, knew little Chebe's story; indeed, they would have
guessed it simply by her manner of making her appearance and by her
demeanor among them.
Sidonie's efforts were unavailing. She retained the manners of a shop-
girl. Her slightly artificial amiability, sometimes too humble, was as
unpleasant as the spurious elegance of the shop; and her disdainful
attitudes recalled the superb airs of the head saleswomen in the great
dry-goods establishments, arrayed in black silk gowns, which they take

off in the dressing-room when they go away at night--who stare with an
imposing air, from the vantage-point of their mountains of curls, at the
poor creatures who venture to discuss prices.
She felt that she was being examined and criticised, and her modesty
was compelled to place itself upon a war footing. Of the names
mentioned in her presence, the amusements, the entertainments, the
books of which they talked to her,