When,after a long and happy journey in Italy,the Comtesse de Vandenesse returned to Paris late in the following winter,all her husband's predictions about Nathan were justified.He had taken Blondet's advice and negotiated with the government,which employed his pen.His personal affairs were in such disorder that one day,on the Champs-Elysees,Marie saw her former adorer on foot,in shabby clothes,giving his arm to Florine.When a man becomes indifferent to the heart of a woman who has once loved him,he often seems to her very ugly,even horrible,especially when he resembles Nathan.Madame de Vandenesse had a sense of personal humiliation in the thought that she had once cared for him.If she had not already been cured of all extra-conjugal passion,the contrast then presented by the count to this man,grown less and less worthy of public favor,would have sufficed her.
第46章 A LOVER SAVED AND LOST(10)（2 / 3）