She was under the
charm, and fearlessly intoxicated herself with a felicity of which she
had dreamed long. She seemed then so marvelously beautiful to Henri,
that all this phantasmagoria of rags and old age, of worn red drapery
and of the green mats in front of the armchairs, the ill-washed red
tiles, all this sick and dilapidated luxury, disappeared.
The room seemed lit up; and it was only through a cloud that one could
see the fearful harpy fixed and dumb on her red sofa, her yellow eyes
betraying the servile sentiments, inspired by misfortune, or caused by
some vice beneath whose servitude one has fallen as beneath a tyrant
who brutalizes one with the flagellations of his despotism. Her eyes
had the cold glitter of a caged tiger, knowing his impotence and being
compelled to swallow his rage of destruction.
"Who is that woman?" said Henri to Paquita.
But Paquita did not answer. She made a sign that she understood no
French, and asked Henri if he spoke English.
De Marsay repeated his question in English.
"She is the only woman in whom I can confide, although she has sold me
already," said Paquita, tranquilly. "My dear Adolphe, she is my
mother, a slave bought in Georgia for her rare beauty, little enough
of which remains to-day. She only speaks her native tongue."
The attitude of this woman and her eagerness to guess from the
gestures of her daughter and Henri what was passing between them, were
suddenly explained to the young man; and this explanation put him at
his ease.
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