She had been faithful to her husband, she had shed sincere and bitter tears over that wretched companion of her youth; but he had exhausted and worn out her affection, and without ever joining her mother in her posthumous recriminations against Monsieur de Trecoeur, she felt that she had no further duty to fulfill toward him but that of prayer.
She had, however, been for many months a widow, and she still continued to oppose to the solicitations of the baroness, a resistance of which the latter sought in vain to ascertain the mysterious cause.

One day she fancied she had discovered it.
"Confess the truth," she said to her; "you are afraid to cause some annoyance to Julia.

Now, if that is so, my dear daughter, it is pure folly.

You cannot have any serious scruple on that score.

Julia will be very rich in her own right, and will have no need of your fortune.