Pagina 679 di 3800

And now he, a real Russian prince, had appeared. He would carry

her away and then sa pauvre mere would appear and he would marry

her. So her future shaped itself in Mademoiselle Bourienne's head

at the very time she was talking to Anatole about Paris. It was

not calculation that guided her (she did not even for a moment

consider what she should do), but all this had long been familiar

to her, and now that Anatole had appeared it just grouped itself

around him and she wished and tried to please him as much as

possible.

The little princess, like an old war horse that hears the

trumpet, unconsciously and quite forgetting her condition,

prepared for the familiar gallop of coquetry, without any

ulterior motive or any struggle, but with naive and lighthearted

gaiety.