Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 2 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/224

THE AMERICAN idea; perhaps you can help me. I want not only to marry, but to marry remarkably well."

"It's a very good project, but I never made a match in all my life," said his hostess with her odd mincing plainness.

Newman looked at her an instant and then all sincerely, "I should have thought you a great hand," he declared.

Madame de Bellegarde might well have thought him too sincere. She murmured something sharply in French and fixed her eyes on her son. At this moment the door of the room was thrown open, and with a rapid step Valentin reappeared. "I've a message for you," he said to his sister-in-law. "Claire bids me ask you not to start for your ball. If you 'll wait a minute she 'll go with you."

"Claire will go with us?" cried the young Marquise. En voilà du nouveau!

"She has changed her mind; she decided half an hour ago and is sticking the last diamond into her hair!" said Valentin.

"What on earth has taken possession of my daughter?" Madame de Bellegarde asked with a coldness of amazement. "She has not been this age where any candle was lighted. Does she take such a step at half an hour's notice and without consulting me?"

"She consulted me, dear mother, five minutes since," said Valentin, "and I told her that such a beautiful woman—she's more beautiful than ever, you 'll see—has no right to bury herself alive."

"You should have referred Claire to her mother, 194