room adjoined, always undressed by this fire, and hung her garters upon Perseus's sword, where they had more than once been found. The poor lady allowed herself no such luxury as a fire in her own room, saving every centime that she could to administer to the comfort of her daughter, whose husband was a struggling something in the "Ponts et Chaussés."
Elizabeth took to the good-natured little woman on her first interview, and grew quite fond of her as time went on. It was said that she had been very pretty once, and, gossip went on to add, had been greatly admired in the thirties by the Duke of Orleans. It was difficult to believe her old enough for this; she did not look more than fifty-five. But in spite of her jet-black hair, with just a silver thread or two crossing it, her fine even teeth and sparkling black eye. Professor Genron, the oldest pensionnaire, who had known her for twenty years, declared her to be seventy. She dressed with scrupulous neatness, in black, with generally a violet or mauve ribbon, which she thought becoming to her complexion; once a clear olive, now some shades deeper, with a tinge of orange. Many a great hostess might have learned from madame the art of amalgamating heterogeneous materials, and setting guests at their ease. It was her study to make those who met at her table happy—to smooth over the rough places, and soften the asperities of prejudice. She was indulgent as to moral peccadilloes—Madame de Belcour said, with her keepsake smile, "Who should be, if Madame Martineau was not?"—but careful, for the sake of the reputation her pension bore, that no flagrant sinners should flaunt their vices under her very nose.
