The gentlemen maintained a respectful silence.
Count Muffat, indeed, had not yet opened his lips. He was thinking
perforce of his own youth. The bedroom of his childish days had been
quite cold, and later, when he had reached the age of sixteen and would
give his mother a good-night kiss every evening, he used to carry the
icy feeling of the embrace into the world of dreams. One day in passing
a half-open door he had caught sight of a maidservant washing herself,
and that was the solitary recollection which had in any way troubled
his peace of mind from the days of puberty till the time of marriage.
Afterward he had found his wife strictly obedient to her conjugal duties
but had himself felt a species of religious dislike to them. He had
grown to man's estate and was now aging, in ignorance of the flesh, in
the humble observance of rigid devotional practices and in obedience to
a rule of life full of precepts and moral laws. And now suddenly he was
dropped down in this actress's dressing room in the presence of this
undraped courtesan.
He, who had never seen the Countess Muffat putting on her garters, was
witnessing, amid that wild disarray of jars and basins and that strong,
sweet perfume, the intimate details of a woman's toilet.
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