In his life of self-renunciation among
the poorer classes, he had grown accustomed to pity women,--to look
upon them more or less as frail, broken creatures needing help and
support,--sometimes to be loved, but far more often to be despised
and neglected. But Sylvie, Comtesse Hermenstein, was not of these,--
he knew, or thought he knew that she needed nothing. Beauty was
hers, wealth was hers, independence of position was hers; and if she
had given a smile or nod of encouragement, lovers were hers to
command. What was he that he should count himself at all valuable in
her sight, even as the merest friend? These despondent thoughts were
doubly embittered by the immense scorn he now entertained for
himself that he should have been such a fool as to listen for a
moment to the silly and malignant gossip circulated among the
envious concerning a woman who was admittedly the superior of those
who calumniated her. For clearest logic shows that wherever
superiority exists, inferiority rises up in opposition, and the
lower endeavours to drag the higher down. Such vague reflections,
coursing rapidly through his, brain, gave him an air of
embarrassment and awkwardness not by any means common to him, as he
advanced, and Sylvie, half rising from her chair, greeted him in her
turn with a little touch of shyness which sent a wave of soft colour
over her face, and made her look ten times prettier than ever.
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