She was short, and very stout--a faded blonde,
with her complexion spoilt by a multitude of freckles. She had
very large hands, broad, thick feet, and a shrill voice; and the
vulgarity of her appearance was all the more noticeable on account
of her pretensions to elegance. For although her father had been
a wood-merchant, she boasted of her exalted birth, and endeavored
to impress people with the magnificence of her style of living,
though her fortune was problematical, and her household conducted
in the most frugal style. Her attire suggested a continual
conflict between elegance and economy--between real poverty and
feigned prodigality. She wore a corsage and overskirt of black
satin; but the upper part of the underskirt, which was not
visible, was made of lute-string costing thirty sous a yard, and
her laces were Chantilly only in appearance. Still, her love of
finery had never carried her so far as shop-lifting, or induced
her to part with her honor for gewgaws--irregularities which are
so common nowadays, even among wives and mothers of families, that
people are no longer astonished to hear of them.
No--Madame de Fondege was a faithful wife, in the strict and legal
sense of the word. But how she revenged herself! She was
"virtuous;" but so dangerously virtuous that one might have
supposed she was so against her will, and that she bitterly
regretted it. She ruled her husband with a rod of iron.
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