Friends of the Vilquins expressed
surprise that the mother and daughter were willing to live on among
the scenes of their former splendor. From her open window behind the
closed blinds Modeste sometimes heard such insolence as this:--
"I am sure I can't think how they can live there," some one would say
as he paced the villa lawn,--perhaps to assist Vilquin in getting rid
of his tenant.
"What do you suppose they live on? they haven't any means of earning
money."
"I am told the old woman has gone blind."
"Is Mademoiselle Mignon still pretty? Dear me, how dashing she used to
be! Well, she hasn't any horses now."
Most young girls on hearing these spiteful and silly speeches, born of
an envy that now rushed, peevish and drivelling, to avenge the past,
would have felt the blood mount to their foreheads; others would have
wept; some would have undergone spasms of anger; but Modeste smiled,
as we smile at the theatre while watching the actors. Her pride could
not descend so low as the level of such speeches.
The other event was more serious than these mercenary meannesses.
Bettina Caroline died in the arms of her younger sister, who had
nursed her with the devotion of girlhood, and the curiosity of an
untainted imagination.
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