Why is there nothing of an inner life? nothing which leads
to revery, nothing reposeful? Why indeed? Because no one in our day is
sure of the future; we are living our lives like prodigal annuitants.
One morning Clementine appeared to be thinking of something. She was
lying at full length on one of those marvellous couches from which it
is almost impossible to rise, the upholsterer having invented them for
lovers of the "far niente" and its attendant joys of laziness to sink
into. The doors of the greenhouse were open, letting the odors of
vegetation and the perfume of the tropics pervade the room. The young
wife was looking at her husband who was smoking a narghile, the only
form of pipe she would have suffered in that room. The portieres, held
back by cords, gave a vista through two elegant salons, one white and
gold, comparable only to that of the hotel Forbin-Janson, the other in
the style of the Renaissance. The dining-room, which had no rival in
Paris except that of the Baron de Nucingen, was at the end of a short
gallery decorated in the manner of the middle-ages. This gallery
opened on the side of the courtyard upon a large antechamber, through
which could be seen the beauties of the staircase.
The count and countess had just finished breakfast; the sky was a
sheet of azure without a cloud, April was nearly over.
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