for a moment stock-still, so greatly was she surprised to see her mistress in her shift, not ill pleased perhaps to let the judge’s wife discern through the thin cloud of lawn a form as white and as perfect as that of Canova’s Venus.  It was like a gem in a fold of tissue paper.  Diane suddenly remembered where a pair of stays had been put that fastened in front, sparing a woman in a hurry the ill-spent time and fatigue of being laced.  She had arranged the lace trimming of her shift and the fulness of the bosom by the time the maid had fetched her petticoat, and crowned the work by putting on her gown.  While Amelie, at a sign from the maid, hooked the bodice behind, the woman brought out a pair of thread stockings, velvet boots, a shawl, and a bonnet.  Amelie and the maid each drew on a stocking.

“You are the loveliest creature I ever saw!” said Amelie, insidiously kissing Diane’s elegant and polished knee with an eager impulse.

“Madame has not her match!” cried the maid.

“There, there, Josette, hold your tongue,” replied the Duchess.—­“Have you a carriage?” she went on, to Madame Camusot.  “Then come along, my dear, we can talk on the road.”

And the Duchess ran down the great stairs of the Hotel de Cadignan, putting on her gloves as she went—­a thing she had never been known to do.

“To the Hotel de Grandlieu, and drive fast,” said she to one of her men, signing to him to get up behind.

The footman hesitated—­it was a hackney coach.

“Ah!  Madame la Duchesse, you never told me that the young man had letters of yours.  Otherwise Camusot would have proceeded differently . . .”

“Leontine’s state so occupied my thoughts that I forgot myself entirely.  The poor woman was almost crazy the day before yesterday; imagine the effect on her of this tragical termination.  If you could only know, child, what a morning we went through yesterday!  It is enough to make one forswear love!—­Yesterday Leontine and I were dragged across Paris by a horrible old woman, an old-clothes buyer, a domineering creature, to that stinking and blood-stained sty they call the Palace of Justice, and I said to her as I took her there:  ’Is not this enough to make us fall on our knees and cry out like Madame de Nucingen, when she went through one of those awful Mediterranean storms on her way to Naples, “Dear God, save me this time, and never again——!"’

“These two days will certainly have shortened my life.—­What fools we are ever to write!—­But love prompts us; we receive pages that fire the heart through the eyes, and everything is in a blaze!  Prudence deserts us—­we reply——­”

“But why reply when you can act?” said Madame Camusot.

“It is grand to lose oneself utterly!” cried the Duchess with pride.  “It is the luxury of the soul.”

“Beautiful women are excusable,” said Madame Camusot modestly.  “They have more opportunities of falling than we have.”