There
remained Leonide de Chezelles and Steiner, an ugly little knot against
which Mme Hugon's elderly and amiable serenity stood out in strange
contrast. And Fauchery, having sketched out his article, named this last
group "Countess Sabine's little clique."
"On another occasion," continued Steiner in still lower tones, "Leonide
got her tenor down to Montauban. She was living in the Chateau de
Beaurecueil, two leagues farther off, and she used to come in daily in
a carriage and pair in order to visit him at the Lion d'Or, where he had
put up. The carriage used to wait at the door, and Leonide would stay
for hours in the house, while a crowd gathered round and looked at the
horses."
There was a pause in the talk, and some solemn moments passed silently
by in the lofty room. Two young men were whispering, but they ceased in
their turn, and the hushed step of Count Muffat was alone audible as he
crossed the floor. The lamps seemed to have paled; the fire was going
out; a stern shadow fell athwart the old friends of the house where they
sat in the chairs they had occupied there for forty years back. It was
as though in a momentary pause of conversation the invited guests
had become suddenly aware that the count's mother, in all her glacial
stateliness, had returned among them.
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