LITMIR.BIZ

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However secretive an old maid may be, there is one sentiment which will always avail to make her break her fast from words, and that is her vanity. For the last three years, Hortense, having become very inquisitive on such matters, had pestered her cousin with questions, which, however, bore the stamp of perfect innocence. She wanted to know why her cousin had never married. Hortense, who knew of the five offers that she had refused, had constructed her little romance; she supposed that Lisbeth had had a passionate attachment, and a war of banter was the result. Hortense would talk of “We young girls!” when speaking of herself and her cousin.

      Cousin Betty had on several occasions answered in the same tone—“And who says I have not a lover?” So Cousin Betty’s lover, real or fictitious, became a subject of mild jesting. At last, after two years of this petty warfare, the last time Lisbeth had come to the house Hortense’s first question had been:

      “And how is your lover?”

      “Pretty well, thank you,” was the answer. “He is rather ailing, poor young man.”

      “He has delicate health?” asked the Baroness, laughing.

      “I should think so! He is fair. A sooty thing like me can love none but a fair man with a color like the moon.”

      “But who is he? What does he do?” asked Hortense. “Is he a prince?”

      “A prince of artisans, as I am queen of the bobbin. Is a poor woman like me likely to find a lover in a man with a fine house and money in the funds, or in a duke of the realm, or some Prince Charming out of a fairy tale?”

      “Oh, I should so much like to see him!” cried Hortense, smiling.

      “To see what a man can be like who can love the Nanny Goat?” retorted Lisbeth.

      “He must be some monster of an old clerk, with a goat’s beard!” Hortense said to her mother.

      “Well, then, you are quite mistaken, mademoiselle.”

      “Then you mean that you really have a lover?” Hortense exclaimed in triumph.

      “As sure as you have not!” retorted Lisbeth, nettled.

      “But if you have a lover, why don’t you marry him, Lisbeth?” said the Baroness, shaking her head at her daughter. “We have been hearing rumors about him these three years. You have had time to study him; and if he has been faithful so long, you should not persist in a delay which must be hard upon him. After all, it is a matter of conscience; and if he is young, it is time to take a brevet of dignity.”

      Cousin Betty had fixed her gaze on Adeline, and seeing that she was jesting, she replied:

      “It would be marrying hunger and thirst; he is a workman, I am a workwoman. If we had children, they would be workmen.—No, no; we love each other spiritually; it is less expensive.”

      “Why do you keep him in hiding?” Hortense asked.

      “He wears a round jacket,” replied the old maid, laughing.

      “You truly love him?” the Baroness inquired.

      “I believe you! I love him for his own sake, the dear cherub. For four years his home has been in my heart.”

      “Well, then, if you love him for himself,” said the Baroness gravely, “and if he really exists, you are treating him criminally. You do not know how to love truly.”

      “We all know that from our birth,” said Lisbeth.

      “No, there are women who love and yet are selfish, and that is your case.”

      Cousin Betty’s head fell, and her glance would have made any one shiver who had seen it; but her eyes were on her reel of thread.

      “If you would introduce your so-called lover to us, Hector might find him employment, or put him in a position to make money.”

      “That is out of the question,” said Cousin Betty.

      “And why?”

      “He is a sort of Pole—a refugee——”

      “A conspirator?” cried Hortense. “What luck for you!—Has he had any adventures?”

      “He has fought for Poland. He was a professor in the school where the students began the rebellion; and as he had been placed there by the Grand Duke Constantine, he has no hope of mercy——”

      “A professor of what?”

      “Of fine arts.”

      “And he came to Paris when the rebellion was quelled?”

      “In 1833. He came through Germany on foot.”

      “Poor young man! And how old is he?”

      “He was just four-and-twenty when the insurrection broke out—he is twenty-nine now.”

      “Fifteen years your junior,” said the Baroness.

      “And what does he live on?” asked Hortense.

      “His talent.”

      “Oh, he gives lessons?”

      “No,” said Cousin Betty; “he gets them, and hard ones too!”

      “And his Christian name—is it a pretty name?”

      “Wenceslas.”

      “What a wonderful imagination you old maids have!” exclaimed the Baroness. “To hear you talk, Lisbeth, one might really believe you.”

      “You see, mamma, he is a Pole, and so accustomed to the knout that Lisbeth reminds him of the joys of his native land.”

      They all three laughed, and Hortense sang Wenceslas! idole de mon ame! instead of O Mathilde.

      Then for a few minutes there was a truce.

      “These children,” said Cousin Betty, looking at Hortense as she went up to her, “fancy that no one but themselves can have lovers.”

      “Listen,” Hortense replied, finding herself alone with her cousin, “if you prove to me that Wenceslas is not a pure invention, I will give you my yellow cashmere shawl.”

      “He is a Count.”

      “Every Pole is a Count!”

      “But he is not a Pole; he comes from Liva—Litha——”

      “Lithuania?”

      “No.”

      “Livonia?”

      “Yes, that’s it!”

      “But what is his name?”

      “I wonder if you are capable of keeping a secret.”

      “Cousin Betty, I will be as mute!——”

      “As a fish?”

      “As a fish.”

      “By your life eternal?”

      “By my life eternal!”

      “No, by your happiness in this world?”

      “Yes.”

      “Well, then, his name is Wenceslas Steinbock.”

      “One of Charles XII.‘s Generals was named Steinbock.”

      “He was his grand-uncle. His own father settled in Livonia after the death of the King of Sweden; but he lost all his fortune during the campaign of 1812, and died, leaving the poor boy at the age of eight without a penny. The Grand Duke Constantine, for the honor of the name of Steinbock, took him under his protection and sent him to school.”

      “I will not break my word,” Hortense replied; “prove his existence, and you shall have the yellow shawl. The color is most becoming to dark skins.”

      “And you will keep my secret?”

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