BEHIND THEIR FANS.

FROM THE FRENCH OF GUSTAVE DROZ.

Last evening I was guilty of a very shameful action. I hid behind a curtained door and listened to a conversation, and, what makes it still more unpardonable in me, I cannot help telling you what I heard. It was this.

I had been at the ball about half an hour when I saw in a corner of the parlor, through the door which leads into the conservatory, a little group of three young girls arrayed in billows of white muslin, who were talking behind their fans with so much animation that it was impossible not to notice them.

These three girls had reached that age when young women's hands are slender but still rosy, when their forms have still that charming delicacy which some people call thinness and others youthfulness, and when their movements have that excessive suppleness which is like awkwardness, but which it would be the height of art to imitate. Leaning back with easy grace in their arm chairs, which were drawn up close together, they were laughing unrestrainedly. Already women and coquettes, they would from time to time stretch out their well-gloved hands and pat their ample draperies with a thousand graceful little gestures. They were already mistresses of the art of looking at things without seeing them, of laughing when they were not amused, of showing their white teeth while smoothing their gloves at the wrist, and while modestly looking down of giving a vibration to their voices like the striking of glass, which cannot fail to attract attention. They had, too, the trick of stopping short in the midst of a movement and posing that you might see the turn of a shoulder or a graceful arm, and of turning their profile to you to show a pretty nose, of catching up their skirts and turning away with a movement like a frightened dove till the ear alone is visible, and replying, "Oh, how you frightened me!" when you have said nothing to them but "How do you do?" Then their way of prattling unceasingly without rhyme or reason, or when both ideas and words fail them of exclaiming, "Oh! oh! oh! yes, indeed!" while stroking their hair!

Ah, dear little creatures! I love them just as they are, so knowing and so pure, so gracious and so skillful. I really love these little angels who make their entrance into the great world between two polkas—who go to a ball instead of going to bed—who broke their doll into pieces two days ago, and now think of painting themselves under the eyes like mamma—who know to a louis the price of a cashmere shawl—are connoisseurs in diamonds, look men straight in the eye, are all worn out when Lent comes, and who during Holy Week, after devoutly nibbling a bit of salmon salad, run off to their religious exercises in boots with tassels and with their hair powdered. I love these little painted lambs as one loves roses in December or green peas in the middle of January. There is simplicity even in their excessive self-possession—something, at any rate, which reminds one of green apples which one longs to taste.

They are already women—in fact, they were when they were born—but still one guesses at their motives, reads their little thoughts: sometimes, too, one finds a clue which is like a revelation. They are—

But pardon me, young ladies! I am afraid I am going too far: perhaps as you turn over these pages you will recall the gentleman who was looking at you so attentively the other evening. Perhaps you will recognize yourselves, however imperfect the sketch may be, and then—But it is too late now not to tell you all.

I slyly opened the library-door, and, turning to the left, I made my way to the conservatory, and stationed myself directly behind you, near the door, in the folds of the curtain, and there I heard it all. I did even more than that: in coming away I snapped off a branch of camellia. What follows is merely the work of a reporter: if memory or skill is lacking, forgive me and I will do better another time.

"No," said the youngest, looking at her pink satin slipper, "I mean the one with the decoration in his buttonhole: don't you see him? He is standing by the mantelpiece, by the side of the big bald man in a white waistcoat."

"Why, the big bald man is not a colonel—no indeed. I know him very well: he comes to see papa. It's Mr. Thingamy—some queer name. After every visit of his we find two casters off the easy-chair. Mamma says he's clever, papa says he's not: as for me, I think he smells of pomade."

"Where does he put his pomade? He has hardly three hairs on his head."

"Yes, but they curl, my dear. I am sure he ought to wear a little crimson velvet cap with tassels. Dear me! how I do hate a man as fat as that! Papa, who is slender in comparison with this bear, seems to me a little—when he is shaving—Well, if it was not papa, I should like to plane him down a little."

"But, girls, I don't mean the stout one: I mean the one by his side, with an aquiline nose and moustaches. There, he is taking an ice. He seems to be a lion. Now he's blowing his nose: he's Colonel C——."

"Oh yes, I see. Dear me! how hard he blows his nose! Your colonel has a cold: one can hear him from here—ha! ha!"

"There is nothing strange in his having a cold: he has just come from Africa: see how tanned he is. Well, my dear, he is a lion."

"Then he is an attaché?"

"Oh, how stupid you are! I said he is a lion because he fought like a tiger, and he—"

"Then say he is a tiger, and have done with it."

—(Shrugging her shoulders) "and that at the battle of Rapata—Ratapa—or Patara—I can't remember exactly what, but it was a frightful battle—where the Arabs bit the dust—That's it, word for word, as papa read it aloud the other day out of the paper."

"Why did they bite the dust?"

"Why, because they were so angry. You know when you are in a passion—Well, in this battle the colonel received a cannon-ball or bullet—I don't remember which—in his left shoulder, and they could not extract it, so he returned to France very ill."

"How terrible those battles must be!"

"It is the day after a battle that is terrible. Just think of it! They found this poor colonel under a mountain of dead men at the very moment the wild beasts were going to devour him like the missionary in the Propagation of the Faith. Being swallowed by a crocodile is indeed terrible."

"That's nothing. When you think you have before you a man with an iron machine in his shoulder that you could hardly lift, you can't help shivering. Oh, it's fine to be a soldier: in fact, you may call it the noblest profession. To begin with, every one respects them, and their life is full of triumph."

"Yes, in time of war, but in time of peace—in time of peace—well, they talk over the way they got their wounds, and the band plays while they are at dinner. It seems the colonel can have the band play whenever he wants to."

"Naturally, since it's his band."

"Well, all that is very nice, and besides that you make calls on the wife of the prefect, the receiver-general and the bishop."

"On the bishop's wife? What are you talking about? Ha! ha!" (She takes off her gloves and begins to bite her nails.)

"I did not say the bishop's wife: you are a naughty girl."

"Besides, it's only a general's wife who makes calls on the prefect's wife, like that."

"I only began with the colonel: one soon gets to be general. Do you suppose that Colonel C——, for instance, won't be a general soon?"

"As for me, I would rather marry a general at once."

"Yes, but a general does not get married in uniform."

"Why not, if you ask him to? That is something fine—a general at the altar. There is nothing more imposing than the military at church. Their gold epaulettes seem to go well with the organ. At the church of the Carmelites there are always one or two officers, but they are little ones, and they do not have the same effect. You did not know I was at the church of the Carmelites on Advent Sunday? Oh, there was a good father there who preached: it was indescribable!—Why don't you wear a braid across the top of your head? My dear child, everybody wears them: won't your mamma let you?"

"It is not that, but you can't possibly make a braid to go over the top and then two rolls behind, all out of your own hair."

"Well, you can get false hair. Ha! ha! what an innocent lamb you are! You can get false hair, my dear child."

"Yes, but papa won't let me: he says I'm too young to begin."

"What a pity! As for me, I had no trouble about it. Mamma said, 'It's vexatious, but what can you do, my child? You can't go to a ball in a cap;' and so we went and bought two beautiful blond braids."

"Why two?"

"Let me finish.—See, there is Madame de V—— coming in: do you hear the door creaking?—Well, as I was saying, I had to buy two braids, for the very simple reason that I lost the first. It was very funny. We had hired a coupé for the day, papa having taken ours for himself: he always does. We started off for the hairdresser's in this hired carriage. I bought a superb braid, and they wrapped it up nicely for me. I got into the coupé and put my little parcel up against the window, you know, under the strap that you pull it up and down by. That was all very nice, but when we got home, and I was looking for my parcel before getting out, no parcel was to be found. I made a great fuss, and mamma did too. Only think! it had slipped in by the glass of the window, and had fallen into the inside of the door. I suppose it's still there. There's no way of getting it again, you see, so I had to buy another braid" (bending down her head coquettishly), "which I have the honor of introducing to you: it is thick, of a good color—one of the very best."

"Oh, I wish I could have one, but I'm afraid I sha'n't before I'm married.—See, there is Jeanne bowing to us. Oh, that everlasting dress of hers! Doesn't she look like a fright with that pink pom-pon in her hair and her red nose? She's a kind-hearted girl, but then that pink! Pink never looks well with light hair. It always looks to me like salmon with white sauce. Ha! ha! Speaking of salmon, by the way, you left too early the other evening: we had such a supper, my dear!"

"Oh, how lovely Juliette looked! Didn't she? What a lovely head she has! I would give ten years of my life to have a head like hers. Ten years, dear me! yes, gladly: life isn't such very good fun, after all. And how becoming that headdress was to her!"

"It was really magnificent: you know it came from Persia."

"Did it, really? From Persia? I heard it came from—you know the place, ever so far off, where the colonies are. And how about her marriage?"

"It's broken off: she said no, and it's all settled."

"But the trousseau? Mamma saw the three cashmere shawls, three wonders! One had red ground with little figures on it—you know the sort they're wearing now: that shawl was really eloquent. I think that sort of thing is like music, it delights one so."

"That was very fine—three cashmeres, and diamonds too, and she said no?"

"She said no, and she was right, for it seems he limped frightfully."

"Who did?"

"The gentleman, of course."

"But, my dear girl, people always give three cashmeres. Only think a minute: the long cashmere for calls in winter—well, that's one; then you must have a square one: it would kill you to wear a long cashmere in hot weather; and then you could not refuse a third to go to the bath or to mass in—well, that makes three, don't you see? I would not be married with fewer. No, thank you, I wouldn't go about looking like a chambermaid. No, indeed I wouldn't."

"Did the gentleman limp very badly? For, after all, he was a consul."

"Oh, as to that, his position is a magnificent one. It seems that in the country where he is consul people are carried in palanquins."

"That's the least thing they can do for lame people. As for me, I think she has done quite right. I have a horror of deformed people: one is never sure that it may not be something catching. Do you remember Sister Adelaide at the convent, who had one leg shorter than the other? Well, I wouldn't have sat down in her chair for a hundred thousand francs."

"What would you have done if you had had to marry her?"

"How silly you are!—Don't look over there: I see M. Pincette coming to ask us to dance. The more I see of him, the more I detest him. He is stupid, he is fair, his whiskers are too large, he doesn't dance in time: he has no attractions. Don't you think he looks like the Abbé Julien, who used to hear our catechisms, and who was always saying, 'Not another word, my children'?"

"Yes, he does look like him, especially when he is waltzing: he has the same eyes. As for me, I don't like a man who looks like a priest. That is not saying anything against priests, my dear. In the first place, a man ought to have brown moustaches: without them he is not worth looking at. Have you seen my brother's moustaches since he left Saint-Cyr? That is the kind of moustaches I like—pointed, pointed and waxed. I used to do them for him last summer, and I fully understand them."

"Ernest is a fine-looking young man; and then he's so strong."

"I hate a Hercules. M. de Saint-Flair is not handsome, is he? Well, I can see very well how he fascinated Adèle with his pale face, thin hair and his look of illness."

"Your M. de Saint-Flair looks as if he were just getting over a fever. When he is sitting round in the corners I am always tempted to offer him a bowl of gruel."

"Oh, that's all very well, but as for distinction, I don't see any one who comes up to him. And then, too, they say he writes poetry."

"Still, I must say I prefer M. de P——."

"What an idea! M. de P——! He's a perfect barrel, and besides he's forty-six or forty-eight years old."

"Well, my dear, a man has to be as old as that to be able to offer a woman an acceptable position. It's not at all bad to be the wife of a banker."

At this moment the music began, and the men came forward to ask my little neighbors to dance. They accepted languidly, with a half-indifferent air. The gentlemen placed their opera-hats on the chairs the ladies had left, and they all advanced, talking, to join the dancers. I followed them with my eyes through the crowd. Each abandoned herself with charming grace to her partner's arm, turning her head a little to one side, her hair floating on the waves of the waltz. Perhaps there was exaggerated ease and a trace of childish awkwardness in their manner. In ten minutes they came back to their places, out of breath, but with bright eyes. They took up their fans again, and while fanning themselves went on with their conversation.

"That gentleman dances very well, but he's a queer creature: he talked to me about geography. Do you know the principal town in the department of the Eastern Pyrenees?"

"No I have forgotten. Dear me! how warm I am! I danced with that partner of yours the other evening: he talked about geography to me too. Isn't it strange that some partners always say the same thing over and over again?"

"Oh, there is mamma making me a sign that it is time to go home. Oh dear! no indeed! It will be like the other evening, when we should have gone to bed as early as the hens if mamma hadn't been asked for the German. Tell your cousin to ask mamma to dance, and to ask me. I like him very much: he at least makes you laugh, even if you don't understand very well what he is talking about. He seems sometimes to be making fun of you, but that's no matter: he's very nice; and then, too, he holds you firmly while dancing, so that you feel perfectly comfortable."

Toward two o'clock in the morning, after having looked through M. de B.'s collection of etchings and played a game of whist, I returned to my station behind the three girls. Two were bravely drinking a glass of claret, and the third a cup of chocolate. They were laughing so loud while leaning back in their chairs, and so talking all together, that I could scarcely catch what they said, but I saw by their loosened hair and the brilliancy of their eyes, and their feverish agitation, that they had not wasted their time. Their mothers, who were quite as animated, had collected together, and three or four gentlemen had gathered round them saying a thousand charming bits of nonsense. The gayety had become so fast and furious in that corner that I despaired of hearing anything more, so I went back to the ante-chamber.

What charming women my adorable little girls will have become in a few years!

Pray do not think that the fever of pleasure, that candlelight and love of waltzing will at all impair the solid treasures which a good education has stored up in their little hearts. This very night when they go to bed these three little angels will piously fold their hands beneath the quilt, so as to keep warm, and will thank Heaven for all that has been done for them, and will beg that they may not catch a horrible cold in the head which will prevent their going to the opera to-morrow. Then, having kissed the little gold medal which protects them from fire and spraining their ankles, and makes them dance in time, they will fall fast asleep to the dim murmur of a waltz, like a bird in his nest.

T. S. Perry.