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should be less carefully dressed than on other occasions; and
that she had a particular fancy for doing the duties of my
toilette that morning with her own hands. It was an amusement
she often indulged in: but she appeared to take more pains on
this occasion than I had ever observed before. To gratify her, I
was obliged to sit at her toilette table, and try all the
different modes she imagined for dressing my hair. In the course
of the operation, she made me often turn my head round towards
her, and putting both hands upon my shoulders, she would examine
me with most anxious curiosity: then, showing her approbation by
one or two kisses, she would make me resume my position before
the glass, in order to continue her occupation.
"This amatory trifling engaged us till dinner-time. The
pleasure she seemed to derive from it, and her more than usual
gaiety, appeared to me so thoroughly natural, that I found it
impossible any longer to suspect the treason I had previously
conjured up; and I was several times on the point of candidly
opening my mind to her, and throwing off a load that had begun to
weigh heavily upon my heart: but I flattered myself with the hope
that the explanation would every moment come from herself, and I
anticipated the delicious triumph this would afford me.
"We returned to her boudoir. She began again to put my hair in
order, and I humoured all her whims; when they came to say that
the Prince of ---- was below, and wished to see her. The name
alone almost threw me into a rage.
"`What then,' exclaimed I, as I indignantly pushed her from me,
`who?--what prince?'
"She made no answer to my enquiries.
"`Show him upstairs,' said she coolly to the servant; and then
turning towards me, `Dearest love! you whom I so fervently
adore,' she added in the most bewitching tone, `I only ask of you
one moment's patience; one moment, one single moment! I will
love you ten thousand times more than ever: your compliance now
shall never, during my life, be forgotten.'
"Indignation and astonishment deprived me of the power of
utterance. She renewed her entreaties, and I could not find
adequate expressions to convey my feelings of anger and contempt.
But hearing the door of the ante-chamber open, she grasped with
one hand my locks, which were floating over my shoulders, while
she took her toilette mirror in the other, and with all her
strength led me in this manner to the door of the boudoir, which
she opened with her knee, and presented to the foreigner, who had
been prevented by the noise he heard inside from advancing beyond
the middle of the ante-chamber, a spectacle that must have indeed
amazed him. I saw a man extremely well dressed, but with a
particularly ill-favoured countenance.
"Notwithstanding his embarrassment, he made her a profound bow.
Manon gave him no time for speech-making; she held up the mirror
before him: `Look, sir,' said she to him, `observe yourself
minutely, and I only ask you then to do me justice.
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