Amongst the embarrassments of story-telling there is one which, to be appreciated, must have been experienced; it is, however, sufficiently intelligible to claim sympathy even by indicating,--we mean the difficulty a narrator has in the choice of those incidents by which his tale is to be marked out, and the characters who fill it adequately depicted.
It is quite clear that a great number of events must occur in the story of every life of which no record can be made; some seem too trivial, some too irrelevant for mention, and yet, when we come to reflect upon real life itself, how many times do we discover that what appeared to be but the veriest trifles were the mainsprings of an entire existence, and the incidents which we deemed irrelevant were the hidden links that connected a whole chain of events? How easy, then, to err in the selection! This difficulty presents itself strongly to us at present; a vast number of circumstances rise before us from which we must refrain, lest they should appear to indicate a road we are not about to travel; and, at the same time, we feel the want of those very events to reconcile what may well seem contradictions in our history.
It not unfrequently happens that an apology is just as tiresome as the offence it should excuse; and so, without further explanation, we proceed. Lady Dorothea soon found herself as much sought after as she had previously been neglected. The Duchesse de Luygnes was the great leader of fashion at Paris; and the marked attentions by which she distinguished her Ladyship at once established her position. Of course her unquestionable claim to station, and her own high connections rendered the task less difficult; while it imparted to Lady Dorothea's own manner and bearing that degree of dignity and calm which never accompany an insecure elevation.
With such refinement of delicacy, such exquisite tact, was every step managed that her Ladyship was left to suppose every attention she received sprung out of her own undeniable right to them, and to the grace and charm of a manner which really had had its share of success some five-and-thirty years before. The gloomy isolation she had passed through gave a stronger contrast to the enjoyment of her present life; and for the first time for years she regained some of that courtly elegance of address which in her youth had pre-eminently distinguished her. The change had worked favorably in her temper also; and Martin perceived, with astonishment, that she neither made injurious comparisons between the present and the past, nor deemed the age they lived in one of insufferable vulgarity. It would scarcely have been possible for Lady Dorothea not to connect her altered position with the friendship between Kate Henderson and her former pupil; she knew it, and she felt it. All her self-esteem could not get over this consciousness; but it was a humiliation reserved for her own heart, since nothing in Kate's manner indicated even a suspicion of the fact. On the contrary, never had she shown herself more submissive and dependent. The duties of her office, multiplied as they were tenfold by her Ladyship's engagements, were all punctually acquitted, and with a degree of tact and cleverness that obtained from Lady Dorothea the credit of a charming note-writer. Nor was she indifferent to the effect Kate produced in society, where her beauty and fascination had already made a deep impression.