GOSSIP
Whilst the younger people danced, the older ones gossiped, and the
absence of any known facts rendered the gossip doubly interesting.
There was one group most especially so engaged; at the further corner
of the room, and with sixteen dancing pairs intervening between it and
the royal daïs, there was little fear of Her Majesty overhearing any
frivolous comments on the all-absorbing topic of the day, or of Madame
Lydie herself being made aware of their existence.
Here Madame de la Beaume, a young and pretty matron, possessed of a
good-looking husband who did not trouble her much with his company,
was the centre of a gaily cackling little crowd, not unlike an
assemblage of geese beside a stream at eventide. Young M. de Louvois
was there and the old Duchesse de Pontchartrain, also M. Crébillon,
the most inveterate scandal-monger of his time, and several others.
They all talked in whispers, glad that the music drowned every echo of
this most enjoyable conversation.
"I have it from my coiffeur, whose son was on duty in an adjacent
room, that there was a violent quarrel between them," said Madame de
la Beaume with becoming mystery. "The man says that Madame Lydie
screamed and raged for half an hour, then flew out of the room and
along the passages like one possessed."
"These English are very peculiar people," said M. Crébillon
sententiously. "I have it on M. de Voltaire's own authority that
English husbands always beat their wives, and he spent some
considerable time in England recently studying their manners and
customs."
"We may take it for granted that milor Eglinton, though partly
civilized through his French parentage, hath retained some of his
native brutality," added another cavalier gravely.
"And it is quite natural that Madame Lydie would not tolerate his
treatment of her," concluded the old Duchess.
"Ah!" sighed Madame de la Beaume pathetically, "I believe that English
husbands beat their wives only out of jealousy. At least, so I have
been told, whereas ours are too often unfaithful to feel any such
violent and uncomfortable pangs."
"Surely," quoth young M. de Louvois, casting an admiring glance at
Madame's bold décolletage, "you would not wish M. de la Beaume to lay
hands on those beautiful shoulders."
"Heu! heu!" nodded Madame enigmatically.
M. Crébillon cast an inquisitorial look at Madame de Stainville, who
was standing close by.
"Nay! from what I hear," he said mysteriously, "milor Eglinton had
quite sufficient provocation for his jealousy, and like an Englishman
he availed himself of the privileges which the customs of his own
country grant him, and he frankly beat his wife."
Every one rallied round him, for he seemed to have fuller details than
any one else, and Madame de la Beaume whispered eagerly:
"You mean M. de Stainville. . . ."
"Hush--sh--sh," interrupted the old Duchess quickly, "here comes
miladi."
The Dowager Marchioness of Eglinton, "miladi," as she was always
called, was far too shrewd and too well versed in the manners and
customs of her friends not to be fully aware of the gossip that was
going on all round the room. Very irate at having been kept in
ignorance of the facts which had caused her son's sudden decision, and
Lydie's strange attitude, she was nevertheless determined that,
whatever scandal was being bruited abroad, it should prove primarily
to the detriment of her daughter-in-law's reputation.
Therefore, whenever, to-night, she noted groups congregated in
corners, and conversations being obviously carried on in whispers, she
boldly approached and joined in the gossip, depositing a poisoned
shaft here and there with great cleverness, all the more easily as it
was generally supposed that she knew a great deal more than she cared
to say.
"Nay! I beg of you, Mesdames and Messieurs," she now said quite
cheerfully, "do not let me interrupt your conversation. Alas! do I not
know its subject? . . . My poor son cannot be to blame in the
unfortunate affair. Lydie, though she may be wholly innocent in the
matter, is singularly obstinate."
"Then you really think that?----" queried Madame de la Beaume eagerly,
and then paused, half afraid that she had said too much.
"Alas! what can I say?" rejoined miladi with a sigh. "I was brought up
in the days when we women were taught obedience to our husband's
wishes."
"Madame Lydie was not like to have learnt the first phrase of that
wholesome lesson," quoth M. de Louvois with a smile.
"Exactly, cher Monsieur," assented miladi, as she sailed majestically
on to another group.
"What did miladi mean exactly?" asked M. Crébillon.
"Oh! she is so kind-hearted, such an angel!" sighed pretty Madame de
la Beaume, "she wanted to palliate Madame Lydie's conduct by
suggesting that milor merely desired to forbid her future intercourse
with M. de Stainville. . . . I have heard that version of the quarrel
already, but I must own that it bears but little resemblance to truth.
We all know that so simple a request would not have led to a really
serious breach between milor and his wife."
"It was more than that, of course, or milor would not have beaten
her," came in unanswerable logic from M. Crébillon.
"Hush--sh--sh!" admonished the old Duchess, "here comes His Majesty."
"He looks wonderfully good-humoured," said Madame de la Beaume, "and
doth not wear at all his usual Thursday's scowl."
"Then we may all be sure, Mesdames and Messieurs," said the
irrepressible Crébillon, "that rumour hath not lied again."
"What rumour?"
"You have not heard?"
"No!" came from half a dozen eager and anxious lips.
"They say that His Majesty the King of France has agreed to deliver
the Chevalier de Saint George to the English in consideration of a
large sum of money."
"Impossible!"
"That cannot be true!"
"My valet had it from Monsieur de Stainville's man," protested M.
Crébillon, "and he declares the rumour true."
"A King of France would never do such a thing."
"A palpable and clumsy lie!"
And the same people, who, five minutes ago, had hurled the mud of
scandal at the white robes of an exceptionally high-minded and
virtuous woman, recoiled with horror at the thought of any of it
clinging to the person of that fat and pompous man, whom an evil fate
had placed on the throne of France.