The Martins Of Cro' Martin, Vol. II (of II). Lever Charles James

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      If we have not followed Martin’s steps through these dreary labyrinths, it is because the path is a worn one; for the same reason, too, we decline to keep him company in his ponderings over them. All that his troubles had taught him was an humble imitation of the tricky natures of those he dealt with; so that he plotted and schemed and contrived, till his very head grew weary with the labor. And so we leave him.

      CHAPTER III. A YOUNG DUCHESS AND AN OLD FRIEND

      Like a vast number of people who have passed years in retirement, Lady Dorothea was marvellously disappointed with “the world” when she went back to it. It was not at all the kind of thing she remembered, or at least fancied it to be. There were not the old gradations of class strictly defined; there was not the old veneration for rank and station; “society” was invaded by hosts of unknown people, “names one had never heard of.” The great stars of fashion of her own day had long since set, and the new celebrities had never as much as heard of her. The great houses of the Faubourg were there, it is true; but with reduced households and dimly lighted salons, they were but sorry representatives of the splendor her memory had invested them with.

      Now the Martins were installed in one of the finest apartments of the finest quarter in Paris. They were people of unquestionable station, they had ample means, lacked for none of the advantages which the world demands from those who seek its favors; and yet there they were, just as unknown, unvisited, and unsought after, as if they were the Joneses or the Smiths, “out” for a month’s pleasuring on the Continent.

      A solitary invitation to the Embassy to dinner was not followed by any other attention; and so they drove along the Boulevards and through the Bois de Boulogne, and saw some thousands of gay, bright-costumed people, all eager for pleasure, all hurrying on to some scheme of amusement or enjoyment, while they returned moodily to their handsome quarter, as much excluded from all participation in what went on around them as though they were natives of Hayti.

      Martin sauntered down to the reading-room, hoping vainly to fall in with some one he knew. He lounged listlessly along the bright streets, till their very glare addled him; he stared at the thousand new inventions of luxury and ease the world had discovered since he had last seen it, and then he plodded gloomily homeward, to dine and listen to her Ladyship’s discontented criticism upon the tiresome place and the odious people who filled it. Paris was, indeed, a deception and a snare to them! So far from finding it cheap, the expense of living – as they lived – was considerably greater than at London. It was a city abounding in luxuries, but all costly. The details which are in England reserved for days of parade and display, were here daily habits, and these were now to be indulged in with all the gloom of solitude and isolation.

      What wonder, then, if her Ladyship’s temper was ruffled, and her equanimity unbalanced by such disappointments? In vain she perused the list of arrivals to find out some distinguished acquaintance; in vain she interrogated her son as to what was going on, and who were there. The Captain only frequented the club, and could best chronicle the names that were great at whist or illustrious at billiards.

      “It surely cannot be the season here,” cried she, one morning, peevishly, “for really there isn’t a single person one has ever heard of at Paris.”

      “And yet this is a strong catalogue,” cried the Captain, with a malicious twinkle in his eye. “Here are two columns of somebodies, who were present at Madame de Luygnes’ last night.”

      “You can always fill salons, if that be all,” said she, angrily.

      “Yes, but not with Tour du Pins, Tavannes, Rochefoucaulds, Howards of Maiden, and Greys of Allington, besides such folk as Pahlen, Lichtenstein, Colonna, and so forth.”

      “How is it then, that one never sees them?” cried she, more eagerly.

      “Say, rather, how is it one doesn’t know them,” cried Martin, “for here we are seven weeks, and, except to that gorgeous fellow in the cocked hat at the porter’s lodge, I have never exchanged a salute with a human being.”

      “There are just three houses, they say, in all Paris, to one or other of which one must be presented,” said the Captain – “Madame de Luygnes, the Duchesse de Cour-celles, and Madame de Mirecourt.”

      “That Madame de Luygnes was your old mistress, was she not, Miss Henderson?” asked Lady Dorothea, haughtily.

      “Yes, my Lady,” was the calm reply.

      “And who are these other people?”

      “The Duc de Mirecourt was married to ‘Mademoiselle,’ the daughter of the Duchesse de Luygnes.”

      “Have you heard or seen anything of them since you came here?” asked her Ladyship.

      “No, my Lady, except a hurried salute yesterday from a carriage as we drove in. I just caught sight of the Duchesse as she waved her hand to me.”

      “Oh, I saw it. I returned the salutation, never suspecting it was meant for you. And she was your companion – your dear friend – long ago?”

      “Yes, my Lady,” said Kate, bending down over her work, but showing in the crimson flush that spread over her neck how the speech had touched her.

      “And you used to correspond, I think?” continued her Ladyship.

      “We did so, my Lady.”

      “And she dropped it, of course, when she married, – she had other things to think of?”

      “I ‘m afraid, my Lady, the lapse was on my side,” said Kate, scarcely repressing a smile at her own hardihood.

      “Your side! Do you mean to say that you so far forgot what was due to the station of the Duchesse de Mirecourt, that you left her letter unreplied to?”

      “Not exactly, my Lady.”

      “Then, pray, what do you mean?”

      Kate paused for a second or two, and then, in a very calm and collected voice, replied, – “I told the Duchesse, in my last letter, that I should write no more, – that my life was thrown in a wild, unfrequented region, where no incident broke the monotony, and that were I to continue our correspondence, my letters must degenerate into a mere selfish record of my own sentiments, as unprofitable to read as ungraceful to write; and so I said good-bye – or au revoir, at least – till other scenes might suggest other thoughts.”

      “A most complimentary character of our Land of the West, certainly! I really was not aware before that Cro’ Martin was regarded as an ‘oubliette.’”

      Kate made no answer, – a silence which seemed rather to irritate than appease her Ladyship.

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