In the meanwhile, I need not detain you any longer." Madame Fontaine rose also--but she was not quite defeated yet.
"As things are, then," she resumed, "I am to understand, sir, that the marriage is put off to the thirteenth of January next ?" "Yes, with your daughter's consent." "Suppose my daughter changes her mind, in the interval ?" "Under your influence ?" "Mr.Keller! you insult me." "I should insult your daughter, Madame Fontaine--after what she said in this room before me and before other witnesses--if I supposed her to be capable of changing her mind, except under your influence.
"Good evening, sir." "Good evening, madam." She went back to her room.
The vacant spaces on the walls were prettily filled up with prints and water-color drawings.

Among these last was a little portrait of Mr.
Keller, in a glazed frame.

She approached it--looked at it--and, suddenly tearing it from the wall, threw it on the floor.

It happened to fall with the glass uppermost.

She stamped on it, in a perfect frenzy of rage; not only crushing the glass, but even breaking the frame, and completely destroying the portrait as a work of art.