Madame de Staël stood with her back to the open fire, her hands clasped behind her, her brilliant black eyes flashing upon the assembled company. Although she had accomplished nothing great ('twas before she wrote "Corinne" or "De l'Allemagne"), she was already famous for her appreciation of Monsieur Rousseau. Indeed, there was something so unusual, so forceful in this large, almost masculine woman, that Calvert was as much impressed with her as he had been disappointed in Monsieur Necker. It seemed as if the mediocre talents of the Minister of Finance had flamed into genius in this leonine creature who was as much her mother's inferior in looks as her father's superior in intelligence. Mingled with this masculinity of mind and appearance was an egotism, a coquetry, a directness of thought and action that combined to make a curious personality. It was amusing to note with what assiduity she showered her attentions on Mr. Morris, the man of the world, of whom she had heard much, and with what polite indifference she dismissed Calvert--though it is but doing her justice to say that later, tiring of her ineffectual efforts to interest Mr. Morris, she made the amende honorable and essayed her coquetries on the younger man, much to his embarrassment. With a slight gesture of command she pointed Mr. Morris to a seat beside her on the divan upon which she had sunk.
"Ah! Monsieur," she said to him, with a languishing glance out of her brilliant eyes and a smile that displayed a row of wonderfully white teeth, "Monsieur de Lafayette tells me that you are un homme d'esprit."
"Madame," returned Mr. Morris, bowing low--perhaps to conceal the ironical smile playing about his lips--"I do not feel myself worthy of such a compliment."
"Mais, si!" insisted Madame de Staël, with another glance, which did not and was not meant to conceal her newly awakened interest in the distinguished-looking American. "We hear that Monsieur has even written a book on the American Constitution."
"Alas, no, Madame! 'Tis a libel, I assure you," returned Mr. Morris, this time laughing outright with the amusement he could no longer conceal. "I have but done my duty in helping to form the Constitution."
"Indeed!" exclaimed Madame de Staël, and then lowering her voice slightly and dropping her coquettish manner for a serious air, "perhaps we shall have occasion to beg of Monsieur Morris some ideas là dessus. There is nothing this poor, distracted France stands so much in need of as a constitution. My father is a great man, on whom the King and country depend for everything" ("In my life I never saw such exuberant vanity," thought Mr. Morris to himself), "but even he must fail at times if not supported by a reasonable constitution. You must come to see me, Monsieur, when we can be alone and discuss this. One who has helped to form his country's laws and has been wounded in her services," and she pointed with an eloquent, somewhat theatrical gesture to Mr. Morris's wooden stump, "cannot fail to be a good adviser."