All at once she met Raphael's steady gaze and turned pale, aghast at
the intolerable contempt in her rejected lover's eyes. Not one of her
exiled suitors had failed to own her power over them; Valentin alone
was proof against her attractions. A power that can be defied with
impunity is drawing to its end. This axiom is as deeply engraved on
the heart of woman as in the minds of kings. In Raphael, therefore,
Foedora saw the deathblow of her influence and her ability to please.
An epigram of his, made at the Opera the day before, was already known
in the salons of Paris. The biting edge of that terrible speech had
already given the Countess an incurable wound. We know how to
cauterize a wound, but we know of no treatment as yet for the stab of
a phrase. As every other woman in the house looked by turns at her and
at the Marquis, Foedora would have consigned them all to the
oubliettes of some Bastille; for in spite of her capacity for
dissimulation, her discomfiture was discerned by her rivals. Her
unfailing consolation had slipped from her at last. The delicious
thought, "I am the most beautiful," the thought that at all times had
soothed every mortification, had turned into a lie.
At the opening of the second act a woman took up her position not very
far from Raphael, in a box that had been empty hitherto.
Pages:
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302