Moths by Ouida — page 134: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

130 MOTHS. - Sat ‘‘ She is very far from stupid; pardon me,” said Madame Nel- aguine, with a delicate little smile. ‘‘ But she has not your hap- py adaptability, chere madame. It is her misfortune.” “A misfortune, indeed,” said Lady Dolly, a little sharply, feeling that her superiority was being despised. ‘‘Itis always a misfortune to be unnatural, and she is unnatural. She takes no pleasure in anything that delights every one else; she hardly knows serge from sicilienne; and she has no tact, because she does not think it worth while to have any. She wvill offend a . king as indifferently as she will change her dress; every kind of amusement bores her, she is made like that. When everybody is laughing round her, she looks grave, and stares like an owl with her great eyes. Oh, dear me! to think she should be my daughter! Nothing odder ever could be than that Vere should be my child.” ‘Except that she should be my brother’s wife,” said Madame Nelaguine, dryly. Lady Dolly was silent. The next day Lady Dolly took advantage of ler husband’s es- cort to leave the Villa Nelaguine for England; she went with reluctance, yet with relief. She was envious of her daughter, and she was impatient with her, and, though she told. herself again and again that Vere’s destiny had fallen in a golden para- dise, the east vind that she hated, moaning through the palms, seemed to send. after her homeward a long-drawn despairing sigh—the sigh of a young life ruined. | Prince Zouroff stayed on in the South, detained there by the seduction of the gaming-tables, until the Christmas season was ast; then, having won very largely, as very rich men often do, e left the Riviera for his handsome hotel in the Avenue du Bois de Boulogne; and Madame Nelaguine left it also. Like many of their country people, they were true children of Paris, and were seldom thoroughly content unless they were within sight of the dome of the Invalides. He felt be would breathe more freely when, from the windows of the railway-carriage, he should see the zinc roofs and shining gilt cupolas of his one heaven upon earth. ** Another year with only her face to look at, with its eyes of unending reproach, and 1 should have gone mad, or cut her throat,” he said, in a moment of confidence, to one of his confi- dants and parasites. : | They hic never been alone one day, indeed; troops of guests had always been about them; but it had not been Paris—Paris, with its consolations, its charm, and its crowds. In Paris he could forget completely that he had ever married, save when it might please his pride to hear the world tell him that he had the most beautiful woman in Europe for his wife. ** Can you notsleep? Do not stareso with your great eyes!” said Prince Zouroff angrily to his wife, as the night train rushed _ through the heart of France, and Vere gazed out over the snow- _ whitened moonlit, country, as the land and the sky seemed to fiy past her. in another carriage behind her was her great jewel-box, set _ betweentwo servants, whose whole duty was to guardit. a 2) books (ale) : ‘vey’ 4. ' A,