Villette

ascent is not difficult to the highest block of building, finishing in the great garret. The skylight, you know, is day and night left half- open for air; by the sky light he entered. Nearly a year ago, I chanced to tell him our legend of the nun, that suggested his romantic idea of the spectral disguise, which I think you must allow he has very cleverly carried out.
    But for the nun's black gown and white veil, he would have been caught again and again both by you and that tiger-Jesuit, M. Paul. He thinks you both capital ghost-seers, and very brave. What I wonder at is, rather your secretiveness than your courage. How could you endure the visitations of that long spectre, time after time, without crying out, telling everybody, and rousing the whole house and neighbourhood?
    Oh, and how did you like the nun as a bed- fellow?
I
dressed her up – didn't I do it well? Did you shriek when you saw her?
I
should have gone mad; but then you have such nerves! – real iron and bend leather! I believe you feel nothing. You haven't the same sensitiveness that a person of my constitution has. You seem to me insensible both to pain and fear and grief. You are a real old Diogenes.
    Well, dear grandmother! and are you not mightily angry at my moonlight flitting and run- away match? I assure you it is excellent fun, and I did it partly to spite that minx, Paulina, and that bear, Dr. John – to show them that, with all their airs, I could get married as well as they. M. de Bassompierre was at first in a strange fume with Alfred; he threatened a prosecution for ›détournement de mineur,‹ and I know not what; he was so abominably in earnest, that I found myself forced to do a little bit of the melodramatic – go down on my knees, sob, cry, drench three pocket-handkerchiefs. Of course, ›mon oncle‹ soon gave in; indeed, where was the use of making a fuss? I am married, and that's all about it. He still says our marriage is not legal, because I am not of age, forsooth! As if that made any difference! I am just as much married as if I were a hundred. However, we are to be married again, and I am to have a trousseau, and Mrs. Cholmondeley is going to superintend it; and there are some hopes that M. de Bassompierre will give me a decent portion, which will be very convenient, as dear Alfred has nothing but his nobility, native and hereditary, and his pay. I only wish uncle would do things unconditionally, in a generous, gentleman-like fashion; he is so disagreeable as to make the dowry depend on Alfred's giving his written promise that he will never touch cards or dice from the day it is paid down. They accuse my angel of a tendency to play: I don't know anything about that, but I
do
know he is a dear, adorable creature.
    I cannot sufficiently extol the genius with which De Hamal managed our flight. How clever in him to select the night of the fête, when Madame (for he knows her habits), as he said, would infallibly be absent at the concert in the park. I suppose
you
must have gone with her. I watched you rise and leave the dormitory about eleven o'clock. How you returned alone, and on foot, I cannot conjecture. That surely was
you
we met in the narrow old Rue St Jean? Did you see me wave my handkerchief from the carriage window?
    Adieu! Rejoice in my good luck: congratulate me on my supreme happiness, and believe me, dear cynic and misanthrope, yours, in the best of health and spirits,
    GINEVRA LAURA DE HAMAL,
    née FANSHAWE.
    P.S. – Remember, I am a countess now. Papa, mama, and the girls at home, will be delighted to hear that. ›My daughter, the Countess! My sister, the Countess.‹ Bravo! Sounds rather better than Mrs. John Bretton, hein?«
     
    In winding up Mistress Fanshawe's memoirs, the reader will no doubt expect to hear that she came finally to bitter expiation of her youthful levities. Of course, a large share of suffering lies in reserve for her future.
    A few words will embody my farther knowledge respecting her.
    I saw her towards the close of her honeymoon. She called on Madame Beck, and sent for me into the salon. She rushed into my arms laughing. She looked very blooming and beautiful: her curls were longer, her cheeks rosier than ever: her white bonnet and her Flanders veil, her orange flowers and her bride's dress, became her mightily.
    »I have got my portion!« she cried at once; (Ginevra ever stuck to the substantial; I always thought there was a good trading element in her composition, much as she