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 scorned the “bourgeoise;”) “and uncle de Bassompierre is quite reconciled. I don’t mind his calling Alfred a ‘nincompoop’⁠—that’s only his coarse Scotch breeding; and I believe Paulina envies me, and Dr. John is wild with jealousy⁠—fit to blow his brains out⁠—and I’m so happy! I really think I’ve hardly anything left to wish for⁠—unless it be a carriage and an hotel, and, oh! I⁠—must introduce you to mon mari . 246 Alfred, come here!”

And Alfred appeared from the inner salon, where he was talking to Madame Beck, receiving the blended felicitations and reprimands of that lady. I was presented under my various names: the Dragon, Diogenes, and Timon. The young Colonel was very polite. He made me a prettily-turned, neatly-worded apology, about the ghost-visits, etc. , concluding with saying that “the best excuse for all his iniquities stood there!” pointing to his bride.

And then the bride sent him back to Madame Beck, and she took me to herself, and proceeded literally to suffocate me with her unrestrained spirits, her girlish, giddy, wild nonsense. She showed her ring exultingly; she called herself Madame la Comtesse de Hamal , and asked how it sounded, a score of times. I said very little. I gave her only the crust and rind of my nature. No matter she expected of me nothing better⁠—she knew me too well to look for compliments⁠—my dry gibes pleased her well enough, and the more impassible and prosaic my mien, the more merrily she laughed.