The wily aunt deeming the tragi-comical play over, bounced into the room, followed by her faithful poodle, standing on his hindlegs, and stretching his head to see what was going on. The naughty nephew—caught like a boy plunging his forefinger into a pot of preserve—was forthwith sent off to bed. Camille was then soothed and quieted, and the aunt after that went off to bed thinking with a sigh of the previous night's rapturous pleasure.
Shortly afterwards the marriage of the cousins took place.
And were they happy!
Is a marriage based on deceit ever a happy one?
Their character were similar in many traits, both, moreover, were suffering from the same hereditary diseases. They were morbidly sensitive, quick to feel every trifle with too great acuteness, magnifying the slightest incidents of daily life with the subtile keenness of their sickly imaginations into unbearable misfortunes. Neither possessed any power of endurance, any wise descrimination, nor that
95
