Felicite sat before the window, smoking, contemplating in turn the
marshes, the sea, and Calyste, to whom she now and then said a few
words about Beatrix. At one time, seeing the marquise strolling about
the garden, she raised a curtain in a way to attract her attention,
and also to throw a band of light across Calyste's book.
"To-day, my child, I shall ask you to stay to dinner; but you must
refuse, with a glance at the marquise, which will show her how much
you regret not staying."
When the three actors met in the salon, and this comedy was played,
Calyste felt for a moment his equivocal position, and the glance that
he cast on Beatrix was far more expressive than Felicite expected.
Beatrix had dressed herself charmingly.
"What a bewitching toilet, my dearest!" said Camille, when Calyste had
departed.
These manoeuvres lasted six days, during which time many conversations,
into which Camille Maupin put all her ability, took place, unknown to
Calyste, between herself and the marquise. They were like the
preliminaries of a duel between two women,--a duel without truce, in
which the assault was made on both sides with snares, feints, false
generosities, deceitful confessions, crafty confidences, by which one
hid and the other bared her love; and in which the sharp steel of
Camille's treacherous words entered the heart of her friend, and left
its poison there.
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