The Purse | Page 9

of wickedness,
as reveal the refined delicacy of a beautiful soul.
Indeed, the face of a woman has this element of mystery to puzzle the
ordinary observer, that the difference between frankness and duplicity,
the genius for intrigue and the genius of the heart, is there inscrutable.
A man gifted with the penetrating eye can read the intangible shade of
difference produced by a more or less curved line, a more or less deep
dimple, a more or less prominent feature. The appreciation of these
indications lies entirely in the domain of intuition; this alone can lead to
the discovery of what everyone is interested in concealing. The old
lady's face was like the room she inhabited; it seemed as difficult to
detect whether this squalor covered vice or the highest virtue, as to
decide whether Adelaide's mother was an old coquette accustomed to
weigh, to calculate, to sell everything, or a loving woman, full of noble
feeling and amiable qualities. But at Schinner's age the first impulse of
the heart is to believe in goodness. And indeed, as he studied Adelaide's

noble and almost haughty brow, as he looked into her eyes full of soul
and thought, he breathed, so to speak, the sweet and modest fragrance
of virtue. In the course of the conversation he seized an opportunity of
discussing portraits in general, to give himself a pretext for examining
the frightful pastel, of which the color had flown, and the chalk in
many places fallen away.
"You are attached to that picture for the sake of the likeness, no doubt,
mesdames, for the drawing is dreadful?" he said, looking at Adelaide.
"It was done at Calcutta, in great haste," replied the mother in an
agitated voice.
She gazed at the formless sketch with the deep absorption which
memories of happiness produce when they are roused and fall on the
heart like a beneficent dew to whose refreshing touch we love to yield
ourselves up; but in the expression of the old lady's face there were
traces too of perennial regret. At least, it was thus that the painter chose
to interpret her attitude and countenance, and he presently sat down
again by her side.
"Madame," he said, "in a very short time the colors of that pastel will
have disappeared. The portrait will only survive in your memory.
Where you will still see the face that is dear to you, others will see
nothing at all. Will you allow me to reproduce the likeness on canvas?
It will be more permanently recorded then than on that sheet of paper.
Grant me, I beg, as a neighborly favor, the pleasure of doing you this
service. There are times when an artist is glad of a respite from his
greater undertakings by doing work of less lofty pretensions, so it will
be a recreation for me to paint that head."
The old lady flushed as she heard the painter's words, and Adelaide
shot one of those glances of deep feeling which seem to flash from the
soul. Hippolyte wanted to feel some tie linking him with his two
neighbors, to conquer a right to mingle in their life. His offer, appealing
as it did to the liveliest affections of the heart, was the only one he
could possibly make; it gratified his pride as an artist, and could not
hurt the feelings of the ladies. Madame Leseigneur accepted, without
eagerness or reluctance, but with the self-possession of a noble soul,
fully aware of the character of bonds formed by such an obligation,
while, at the same time, they are its highest glory as a proof of esteem.
"I fancy," said the painter, "that the uniform is that of a naval officer."

Yes," she said, "that of a captain in command of a vessel. Monsieur de
Rouville--my husband--died at Batavia in consequence of a wound
received in a fight with an English ship they fell in with off the Asiatic
coast. He commanded a frigate of fifty-six guns and the Revenge
carried ninety-six. The struggle was very unequal, but he defended his
ship so bravely that he held out till nightfall and got away. When I
came back to France Bonaparte was not yet in power, and I was refused
a pension. When I applied again for it, quite lately, I was sternly
informed that if the Baron de Rouville had emigrated I should not have
lost him; that by this time he would have been a rear-admiral; finally,
his Excellency quoted I know not what degree of forfeiture. I took this
step, to which I was urged by my friends, only for the sake of my poor
Adelaide. I have always hated the idea of holding out my hand as a
beggar in the name of a grief which deprives a