Page:The Writings of Prosper Merimee-Volume 3.djvu/176

154 154 THE ETRUSCAN VASE

in silence, though scarce able to suppress his bursting sighs.

A single candle hghted the Countess's room. They sat down, and Saint-Clair noticed his friend's coiffure; a single rose was in her hair. He had given her, the previous evening, a beau- tiful English engraving of Leslie's " Duchess of Portland " (whose hair was dressed in the same fashion), and Saint-Clair had merely re- marked to the Countess, " I like that single rose better than all your elaborate coiffures." He did not like jewels, and inclined to the opinion of a noble lord who once remarked coarsely, " The devil has nothing left to teach women who overdress themselves and coil their hair fantasti- cally." The night before, while playing with the Countess's pearl necklace (he always would have something between his hands when talk- ing), Saint-Clair had said, " You are too pretty, Mathilde, to wear jewels; they are only meant to hide defects." To-night the Countess had stripped herself of rings, necklaces, earrings and bracelets, for she stored up his most trivial re- marks. He noticed, above everything else in a woman's toilet, the shoes she wore; and, like many other men, he was quite mad on this point. A heavy shower had fallen at sunset, and the grass was still very wet; in spite of this the