She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she was unusually quiet for a little time, during which her terrible eyes scanned every detail of Yseulte's appearance, from the pearl solitaire at her throat to the gold buckles in her shoes. Then, with a shriek of laughter, she cried aloud:
'Do you remember when you came first to us you had leather shoes--leather!--and no heels, and mamma sent you at once to have some proper shoes; and how you could not walk a step in them, and cried?'
'I remember,' said Yseulte good-humouredly, 'but I wonder you do--you were so little.'
'Oh, I never forget anything,' replied Blanchette, sagely. 'What beautiful feet you have now, and you are so grown, so grown! And I want to see all your jewels. Mamma says they are wonderful. I love jewels.'
'You shall see them, if you like, by-and-bye. But you did see many before my marriage.'
'But mamma says he has given you ever so many more since--that you were covered with them at your ball.'
Yseulte smiled as she spoke--the dreamy introspective smile of one who recalls happy hours.
'_Tope-là_, while it lasts,' said the small cynic before her.
'Papa never gives mamma anything,' pursued Blanchette. 'Papa gives heaps of things to Mdlle. Fraise; the one they call Rose Fraise. She plays; she has eyes like saucers; she is at the Variétés; she rides a roan horse in the Bois of a morning. Don't you go to the theatre every night? When I marry I shall have a box at every house. I have gone to Hengler's. Now show me the jewels, will you?'
To humour the child, Yseulte took her to her dressing-room, where the tortoiseshell and silver box, which was the outer shell of the iron fire-proof jewel case, was kept, and told her women to open it. Blanchette remained in an almost religious ecstasy before the treasures exposed to her adoring eyes. Nothing could awe this true child of her century except such a display as she now saw of ropes of pearls, streams of sapphires, emeralds green as the deep sea, diamonds in all possible settings, rare Italian jewels of the Renaissance, and Byzantine and Persian work of the rarest quality. She was, after an hour's worship, with difficulty persuaded to leave the spot where such divine objects were shut within their silver shrine defended by Chubb's locks.