"
A woman's thought is endowed with incredible elasticity. When she
receives a knockdown blow, she bends, seems crushed, and then renews
her natural shape in a given time.
"Felix is no doubt right," thought she.
But three days later she was once more thinking of the serpent,
recalled to him by that singular emotion, painful and yet sweet, which
the first sight of Raoul had given her. The count and countess went to
Lady Dudley's grand ball, where, by the bye, de Marsay appeared in
society for the last time. He died about two months later, leaving the
reputation of a great statesman, because, as Blondet remarked, he was
incomprehensible.
Vandenesse and his wife again met Raoul Nathan at this ball, which was
remarkable for the meeting of several personages of the political
drama, who were not a little astonished to find themselves together.
It was one of the first solemnities of the great world. The salons
presented a magnificent spectacle to the eye,--flowers, diamonds, and
brilliant head-dresses; all jewel-boxes emptied; all resources of the
toilet put under contribution. The ball-room might be compared to one
of those choice conservatories where rich horticulturists collect the
most superb rarities,--same brilliancy, same delicacy of texture. On
all sides white or tinted gauzes like the wings of the airiest
dragon-fly, crepes, laces, blondes, and tulles, varied as the fantasies
of entomological nature; dentelled, waved, and scalloped; spider's webs
of gold and silver; mists of silk embroidered by fairy fingers; plumes
colored by the fire of the tropics drooping from haughty heads; pearls
twined in braided hair; shot or ribbed or brocaded silks, as though
the genius of arabesque had presided over French manufactures,--all
this luxury was in harmony with the beauties collected there as if to
realize a "Keepsake.
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