A Parisian Romance — page 154: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A PARISIAN ROMANCE. 145 foolishly encouraged her, and declared that it was an outrage for Henri to refuse his consent, and keep her chained down to a monotonous routine of household duties. Madame Charteris was perhaps not wholly un- selfish in speaking as she did. The De Targy’s loss of fortune had been a severe blow to her, as she could no longer bask in their reflected radiance, and she was in constant fear that she might be called upon to aid them from her own, by no means large income. It was arather pleasant idea to her to think of her niece as a great prima donna, rich and feted, and it seemed to her an admirable solu- tion of the dilemma. Aunt Reine was by no means a bad woman, but she was a thoroughly self-indul- gent one. From a gay, charming, loving girl, Marcelle be- came, little by little, moody and reserved. It was by no means that she had ceased to love her hus- band, but he was unfortunately no longer the Prince Charming who could give her the luxuries of thig _ life, which she so dearly loved. Henri, of course, ‘had seen the change, and it cut him to the heart; but he had every confidence in his wife, and he felt gure that in time she would feel his devotion and loving care to be acompensation for all she had lost. Such was the state of affairs, when, one after- noon, as Madame de Targy sat. engaged in some needle work, in the simple room, which served at ComicbookssGcor