"I hope," said Madame B-----, "that you will not prevent Louise from coming to the ball which I am giving this week." The baron made her a respectful bow. This ball was a triumph of Madame B-----'s and the ruin of the husband of Louise; for he became desperately enamored of Emilie, to whom he would have sacrificed a hundred lawful wives. Some months after that evening on which the baron gained some hopes of succeeding with his wife's friend, he found himself one morning at the house of Madame B-----, when the maid came to announce the Baroness de V-----. "Ah!" cried Emilie, "if Louise were to see you with me at such an hour as this, she would be capable of compromising me. Go into that closet and don't make the least noise." The husband, caught like a mouse in a trap, concealed himself in the closet. "Good-day, my dear!" said the two women, kissing each other. "Why are you come so early?" asked Emilie. "Oh! my dear, cannot you guess? I came to have an understanding with you!" "What, a duel?" "Precisely, my dear. I am not like you, not I! I love my husband and am jealous of him. You! you are beautiful, charming, you have the right to be a coquette, you can very well make fun of B-----, to whom your virtue seems to be of little importance. But as you have plenty of lovers in society, I beg you that you will leave me my husband. He is always at your house, and he certainly would not come unless you were the attraction." "What a very pretty jacket you have on." "Do you think so? My maid made it." "Then I shall get Anastasia to take a lesson from Flore--" "So, then, my dear, I count on your friendship to refrain from bringing trouble in my house." "But, my child, I do not know how you can conceive that I should fall in love with your husband; he is coarse and fat as a deputy of the centre. He is short and ugly--Ah! I will allow that he is generous, but that is all you can say for him, and this is a quality which is all in all only to opera girls; so that you can understand, my dear, that if I were choosing a lover, as you seem to suppose I am, I wouldn't choose an old man like your baron. If I have given him any hopes, if I have received him, it was certainly for the purpose of amusing myself, and of giving you liberty; for I believed you had a weakness for young Rostanges." "I?" exclaimed Louise, "God preserve me from it, my dear; he is the most intolerable coxcomb in the world. No, I assure you, I love my husband! You may laugh as you choose; it is true. I know it may seem ridiculous, but consider, he has made my fortune, he is no miser, and he is everything to me, for it has been my unhappy lot to be left an orphan. Now even if I did not love him, I ought to try to preserve his esteem. Have I a family who will some day give me shelter?" "Come, my darling, let us speak no more about it," said Emilie, interrupting her friend, "for it tires me to death." After a few trifling remarks the baroness left.