Parisian Points of View | Page 6

her first name, all at once, on Tuesday morning, a person whom one didn't so call Monday night. But a person whom one already knew well, where would be the pleasure? He made a movement, Aunt Louise; did you see?"
"I saw--"
"He recognized the phrase."
"True. I remember--"
"Ah! but you did not say that phrase only--you said all the others. But that is nothing as yet, Aunt Louise. Do you know what was his principal objection to a marriage with me? Do you know what he told Robert? That he had seen me in evening-dress the night before for the first time, and that I was too thin! Too thin! Ah! that was a cruel blow to me! For it was true. I was thin. The evening after Gabrielle had told me that awful fact, that evening in undressing I looked at my poor little shoulders, with their poor little salt-cellars, and I had a terrible spasm of sorrow--a flood of tears that wouldn't stop--a torrent, a real torrent; and then mamma appeared. I was alone, disrobed, hair flying, studying my shoulders, deploring their meagreness--a true picture of despair! Mamma took me in her arms. 'My angel, my poor dear, what is the matter?' I answered only by sobbing. 'My child, tell me all.' Mamma was very anxious, but I could not speak; tears choked my voice. 'My dearest, do you wish to kill me?' So to reassure mamma I managed to say between my sobs: 'I am too thin, mamma; last night Gontran thought me too thin!' At that mamma began to laugh heartily; but as she was good-humored that evening, after laughing she explained to me that she, at seventeen, had been much thinner than I, and she promised me in the most solemn manner that I should grow stouter. Mamma spoke true; I have fattened up. Will you have the goodness, sir, to declare to our aunt that the salt-cellars have entirely disappeared, and that you cannot have against me, in that respect, any legitimate cause of complaint?"
"I will declare so very willingly; but you will permit me to add--"
"I will permit you no such thing. I have the floor, let me speak; but you will soon have a chance to justify yourself. I intend to put you through a little cross-questioning."
"I'll wait, then--"
"Yes, do. So last spring I began my first campaign. I do not know, Aunt Louise, what the customs were in your time, but I know that to-day, at the present time, the condition of young girls is one of extreme severity. We are kept confined, closely confined, till eighteen, for mamma was very indulgent in bringing me out when I was only seventeen; but mamma is goodness itself, and then she isn't coquettish for a sou--she didn't mind admitting that she had a marriageable daughter. All mothers are not like that, and I know some who are glad to put off the public and official exhibition of their poor children so as to gain a year. At the same time that they race at Longchamps and Chantilly the great fillies of the year, they take from their boxes the great heiresses of the year who are ripe for matrimony, and in a series of white balls given for that purpose, between Easter Sunday and the Grand Prix, they are made to take little trial gallops before connoisseurs. They have to work rapidly and find a buyer before the Grand Prix; for after that all is up, the young girls are packed back to their governesses, dancing-masters, and literary professors. The campaign is over. That is all for the year. They are not seen again, the poor things, till after Lent. So mamma took me last year to a dozen large balls, which were sad and sorrowful for me. He was not there! He didn't wish to marry! He told it to every one insolently, satirically. He would never, never, never marry! He told it to me."
"At your mother's request."
"Yes, that is true. I know since that it was at mamma's petition that he talked that way; she hoped it would prevent my being stubborn in my craze for him."
"Craze!" exclaimed Aunt Louise.
"Excuse me, Aunt Louise, it is a word of to-day."
"And means--"
"It means a sort of unexplainable, absurd, and extravagant love that comes without its being possible to know why--in short, Aunt Louise, exactly the love I have for him."
"Much obliged! But you do not tell everything. You do not say that your mother desired your marriage with Courtalin--"
"Yes, of course; mamma was quite right. M. de Courtalin has a thousand sterling merits that you have not--that you will never have; and then M. de Courtalin had a particularly good point in mamma's eyes: he did not find me too thin, and he asked for