A smile of incredulity passed upon the lips of Leopoldine, who was about to make an answer in accordance with that smile, when M. de Berville was announced. Although of an age somewhat too mature for a _very_ young man, his dignified and elegant manners, his fine figure, his distinguished intellect, his reputation as a man of honor, together with his fortune, made him “a match” which no young lady could deem unworthy; and I have made the reader already acquainted with the favorable sentiments entertained towards him by the beautiful Leopoldine. Stephanie entertained full as high an opinion of his merits as her younger sister; it may be even, that being best able to appreciate the estimable character of M. de Berville, she rendered to it the most justice; but she received him simply as a mother who believes she has met the future protector of her daughter, and endeavored, by innocent means, to bring to a successful issue the plan of happiness which she had secretly conceived. The aunt, piquing herself on her skill in finesse, sat observant of the actors in that scene, hoping to penetrate from their behavior, into their most secret thoughts. As to Leopoldine, the veil of modesty, beneath which she sought to conceal her real feeling, was not sufficient entirely to conceal the joy of the coquette, rejoicing in the triumph of her charms. Yet that joy and that triumph received some checks; for she did not appear, even during that visit, to occupy exclusively the attention of M. de Berville, as though she alone was the object he came to visit. The conversation took a serious and instructive turn—one little suited to the taste of the young and frivolous. They discoursed of the sciences, the arts, and of {650} literature: I have said that Stephanie had made these things a source of comfort and recreation—that she had occupied her mind in such pursuits, not for the purpose of display, but as a charm to her leisure hours; such a companion as M. de Berville was well adapted to value rightly the mind and the knowledge of Stephanie. She suffered herself to be drawn into the current of the various topics of conversation with a pleasure very natural; and Madame Dorothée plainly perceived that de Berville was even more pleased than her amiable niece.