de Nueil. After his marriage she still continued to live
there, for some inscrutable woman's reason; any woman is at liberty to
assign the one which most appeals to her. Claire de Bourgogne lived in
such complete retirement that none of the servants, save Jacques and
her own woman, ever saw their mistress. She required absolute silence
all about her, and only left her room to go to the chapel on the
Valleroy estate, whither a neighboring priest came to say mass every
morning.
The Comte de Nueil sank a few days after his marriage into something
like conjugal apathy, which might be interpreted to mean happiness or
unhappiness equally easily.
"My son is perfectly happy," his mother said everywhere.
Mme. Gaston de Nueil, like a great many young women, was a rather
colorless character, sweet and passive. A month after her marriage she
had expectations of becoming a mother. All this was quite in
accordance with ordinary views. M. de Nueil was very nice to her; but
two months after his separation from the Marquise, he grew notably
thoughtful and abstracted. But then he always had been serious, his
mother said.
After seven months of this tepid happiness, a little thing occurred,
one of those seemingly small matters which imply such great
development of thought and such widespread trouble of the soul, that
only the bare fact can be recorded; the interpretation of it must be
left to the fancy of each individual mind.
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