Two days later, the Countess, her son and the Baron left for Brussels.
Madame Styvens had questioned Esperance very adroitly, and she left Penhouet with a pretty good idea of her tastes and preferences.
It was then the end of August, and the banns were to be published for November. The Baron was to arrange for the marriage in Brussels, but it was agreed that the young couple should live in Paris, and the Countess proposed to pick out a pretty house to shelter the happiness of her son. She herself would live in Paris; but she refused to share their home.
"I shall look for a house or an apartment near by."
The adieux were tender on both sides. Esperance was so sensitive to the charm of her mother-in-law that it made her seem devoted to her fiancée....
The news of the engagement of Esperance and the Count Styvens was known all over Paris. Letters came to the farm of Penhouet, done up in packets. Many expressed to the philosopher and his wife their joy at hearing that their daughter had decided to leave a career so ... so very ... in which ... in fact that...! Every absurd prejudice, so puritanly ingrained in the minds of most middle class divisions and sections and even amongst the more cultivated, was endlessly repeated upon with the usual banalities in the large correspondence of their friends and others. Poor actors, so misunderstood! so misrepresented! The philosopher showed all the letters to Esperance, who shrugged her shoulders, astonished to find there was so much prejudice in the world against her beloved calling. One letter, however, she took quite seriously. It was written by the most eminent of all the Academicians. One sentence in the epistle wounded the poor child very deeply. "Now I shall be able to go about your election with more confidence and security. Dare I admit to you, my dear Professor, that the only obstacle I encountered, and which seemed to me insurmountable, was the career chosen by that lovely child, your daughter, whose talent we all admire so much! Now I can start my campaign, and I am very sure, my dear Darbois, of achieving our ambition without much difficulty. Therefore, perhaps, I shall not altogether deserve your thanks."
What Genevieve had said was patently true; her father had sacrificed his dearest hope for her, and he had done it so all unostentatiously.... Ah! how she loved her father, who was unlike other men! He was standing there before her, smiling, a little scornful of all these little souls. And as he handed her another letter--"No, father dear, no, I beg you. Pardon me the wrong that I have been doing you; I admire you and I love you, dear papa, but leave me with the noble feeling of your supreme kindness; I would rather not know any more of the little meannesses of the world."