Jacqueline -- Volume 1

d plot to mature. Had she not absented herself in like manner the year before at the same date-thus enabling an upholsterer to drape artistically her little salon with beautiful thick silk tapestrie

out it whatever. Madame de Nailles received the good wishes of her family, responded to them with all proper cordiality, and

e said, with all conf

arien!-A portrait by

ueli

But something strange occurred. Madame de Nailles sprang back a step or two, stretching out her arms as if repelling an a

at is it?" cried Jacqueline,

sengaged herself ang

cried, "let me alo

nto her own chamber. Thither her husband followed her, anxious and bewildered,

authority over his child?-a girl who was already too much disposed to emancipate herself. Her own efforts had all been directed to curb this alarming propensity- yes, alarming-alarming for the future. And all in vain! There was no use in saying more. 'Mon Dieu'! had he no trust in her devotion to his child, in her prudence and her fores

The blonde angel, whose beauty was on the wane, was transformed into a fury. Her six-and- thirty years were fully apparent, her complexion appeared slightly blotched, all her defects were obtrusive in contrast with the precocious development of beauty in Jacquelin

ou no longer love me!" he did not know what to do to prove how bitterly he repented having grieved her. He stammered, he made excuses, he owned that he had been to blame, that he had been very stupid, and he begged her pardon. As to the por

and was forced at last to leave her and to return

des, you must know that this unlucky picture is not in the least like you. Marien has made some us

r's vanity, and promoting that dangerous spirit of independence, denounced to

in her turn,

n her to tell all she knew, under pain of being dismissed immediately, she saw but one way of retaining her situation, which was to deliver up Jacqueline, bound hand and foot, to the anger of her

nger, to be treated with coldness by her father, to see in the blue eyes of her stepmother-eyes so soft and tender when they looked upon her hitherto-only a harsh, mistrustful glare, almost a look of hatred, was a punishment greater than she could bear. What had she done to deserve punishment? Of what was she accused?

wall of ice that had arisen between her stepmother and herself might be cast down. By this time she cared less to know of what fault she was supposed to be guilty than to be taken back into favor as before. What must she do to obtain forgiveness? Explanations are usually worthless; besides, none might be granted her. She remembered that when she was a small child she had obtained immediate oblivion of any fault by throwing herself im

was usually alone. Jacqueline went to her bedchamber, but she was not there, and a moment after she stood on the threshold of t

" she thought. "How

that she can't hear me. I will slip behind her chair, and I will hug her suddenly,

e her stand motionless. She recognized the tones of Marien. He was pleading, imploring, interrupted now and then by the sharp and still angry voice of her mamma. They were not speaking above their br

es, dryly. "It is enough for me that she produced an ill

e pinafores, who has grown up under my very eyes? But, so far as I am concerned, she exists no longer. She is not,

She shivered and leaned

ch she has inspired you. You may say what you like, but I k

oti

etext ought you to have been

, as you may suppose. But you are making too much of an imaginary fault. Consign the wretched picture to the barn, if you like. We will neve

ot she it will be some one else. I am very

in an accent that went to Ja

e, that he had said "Clotilde!" to her mother, that he had called her dear-she!-the woman she had so adored, so venerated, her best friend, her father's wife, her mother by adoption! Everything in this world seemed to be giving way under her feet. The wo

st of being on her knees beside her bed, with her face hidden in the bed-clothes. She

she cried

ame? Or was it an appeal, vibrating with remorse, to her real mother,

swamp before her seemed more deep, more dark, more dreadful from uncertainty, and Jacqueline felt that thenceforward she could make no step in life without risk of falling into it. To whom now could she open her heart in confidence-that heart bleeding and bruised as if it had been trampled one as if some one had crushed it?

length, rising from her knee

nge so suddenly accomplished in herself had left its visible traces on her features, she seemed to see something in her eyes that spoke of the clairvoyance of des

perienced? And then, when she was sad, she could always find a refuge in that dear mamma-in that Clotilde whom she vowed she would never kiss again, except with such kisses as might be necessary to avoid suspicion. Kisses of that kind were worth nothing. Quite the contrary! Could she kiss her father now without a pang? Her father! He had gone wholly over to the side of that other in this affair. She had seen him in one moment turn against herself. No!-no one was left her!.... If she could only lay her head in Modeste's lap and be soothed while

these keepsakes, she tore them with her nails, she trampled them underfoot, she reduced them to fragments; she left nothing whatever of them, except a pile of shreds, which at last she set fire to. She had a feeling as if she were employed in executing two gre

ouvenir.... me s

all -were dreams. He was making a fool of me when he gave me that pink which is now in this pile of ashes. He was laughing when he told me I

ave been annihilated on the spot. She was at that moment a murderess at heart. But the dinner-bell rang. The young fury gave a last glance at the adornments of her pretty bedchamber, so elegant, so original-all blue and pink, with a couch covered with silk embroidered with flowers. She seemed to say to them all: "Keep my secret. It is a sad one

t the task before her was more difficult than she had expected. Apparently, as a proof of reconciliation, Marien had been kept to dinner. To see him so soon again after his words of outrage was more than she could bear. For one moment

gly by her tears, and this gave her a perverse satisfaction in the midst of her misery. Of Marien she thought: "He sits there as if he had been put 'en peniten

ose all my energy, I shall lose even my talent! While I wear these chains I shall see ever before me-ah! tortures of Tantalus!-the vision of a new love, fresh as the dawn which beckons to me as it passes before my sight, which lays on me the light touch of a caress, whi

with an expression she strove to make indifferent, but which he interp

about some vehement discussion of a new law going on just then in the Chamber, and he bec

s, said abruptly, a short time before dessert was placed upon the

ttle-let it be after the rising of the Chamber. We will follow your steps. It has been the desire of my wife's

, whichever suits you,"

! Why couldn't they leav

a ball and chain

smile-the first smile she had given h

r displeasure," he said

first time of his intended journey, and how he had added, in a tone which she now knew

that when they left the dinner-table she escape

Don't you think, 'mon ami', she is as yellow as a quince!" Marien dared not press the hand which s

my poor Jacqueline!"

glance at once haughty and defiant, "

s, she had the

alked about "low fever," attributed it to too rapid growth, and prescribed sea-bathing for her that summer. The fever, which was

the soft half-light that was soothing to her nerves. The silence was broken at intervals by the voice of Modeste, who would come and offer her her medicine. When Jacqueli

things, little noticed at the time, were recalled to her remembrance. They might mean nothing, or they might mean much. In the latter case, Jacqueline could not understand them very well. But she knew he had called her "Clotilde," that he had even dared

a volume from those shelves had no more occurred to her than the idea of taking money out of somebody's purse; that is, up to this moment it had not occurred to her to do so; but now that she had lost all respect for those in authority over her, Jacqueline considered herself released from any obligation to obey them. She therefore made use of the first opportunity that presented itself to take down a novel of George Sand, which she had heard spoken of as a very dangerous book, not doubting it would throw some light on the subject that absorbed her. But she shut up the volume in a rage when she found that it had nothing but excuses to offer for the fall of a married woman. After that, and guided only by chance, she read a number of other novels, most of which were of antediluvian date, thus accounting, she supposed, for their sentiments, which she found old fashioned. We should be wrong, however, if we supposed that Jacqueline's crude judgment of these books had nothing in common with true criticism. Her only object, however, in reading all this sentimental prose was to dis

r, with some false ideas besides. When she was well again, however, she continued weak and languid; she felt somehow as if, she had come back to her old surroundings from some place far away. Everything about her now seemed sad and unfamiliar, though outwardly nothing was altered. Her parents had apparently forgotten the unhappy episode of the picture. It had been sent away to Grandchaux, which was tantamount to its bei