Book #1: Suzy's Dream (Chapter 6 - Part 3)

 Chapter 6 continued...

Truly, it was a pleasure for him to see her again, for he found her a very attractive, petite individual.

Instinctively, he showed himself eager to be at her side. The delight of his dilettantism met her beautiful youthful smile, and the brightness of her brown eyes lit up when he spoke to her.

To hear her speak, awakened Georges’s lively manner, and the memories of their common stay at Le Castel, but he took no interest in the general conversation.

“Listening to you talk, I find I’m rediscovering you all over again,” he said suddenly, with a smile. “But just now, in the Rue de Prony, you seemed quite a different person, a very striking person.”

She blushed a little. “Then I looked serious, like a lady?” she asked, amused.

“Yes, so much so that for a second I hesitated to recognize you.”

Suzy's blush increased, flushing to her forehead, which had been so white under her unruly brown locks.

“No doubt you were surprised to see me alone. It was the first time such a thing has happened to me, and it was very daunting. But I must get used to it because this winter I'm going to give lessons!”

“Lessons?” he echoed, questioningly, without understanding. “Lessons of what exactly? And why lessons?”

He looked so surprised that she began to laugh in spite of herself.

“Music lessons, if I’m able to,” she murmured in a lower voice, as a tenseness pressed against her mouth. “You don’t think I can do it, do you?” she continued half sad, half mischievous. 

“Yes, of course! But it seems to me very... dreadful to think that you will have such hard work.”

Suzy had always appeared to Georges de Flers in an elegant setting which seemed so naturally his own that he had never dreamed that she could be deprived of it. And the girl's words clashed in his mind, creating an unpleasant impression.

The idea of seeing this exquisite little Suzy forced to do mercenary work, thus using her admirable talent as a musician, was, as he had just said, dreadful to imagine—painful even for her. Also for him, because his esthetically pleasing taste was shocked by it.

He felt the same sensation as if he had seen a work of art profaned, as if a brutal hand had suddenly snatched from Suzy the poetry of her youth. Without realizing it, Georges cast an anxious glance at her, as if the revelation she had just made to him showed her to be different somehow.

With a distracted hand, Suzy raised the little silver-gilt spoon form her cup to her lips, parting her pearly teeth. Her face seemed alight from the look in her wide, brown eyes.

She was delightfully pretty, as always. Georges thought that he would ask her no more questions, instead observing her, while she smiled and listened to Germaine, immersed in the story of a very Parisian anecdote.

Suddenly, Germaine stopped mid-story as a new visitor entered the room.

“Ah, Lady Graham!”

A shiver shook Suzy from head to toe. The spell was broken, the happy visions scattered; her hand trembled as she rested it on the table, her cup half empty.

Georges de Flers had not noticed, for he arose to welcome Lady Graham. But as he turned back to Suzy, he saw the expression on her face so changed that he quickly asked, “What’s wrong? Are you unwell?”

“No, no, it’s nothing.”

Suzy almost felt impatient to hear Georges speaking to her. She would have liked to be entirely absorbed in studying this newly arrived Lady Graham, just now when this woman was occupying Suzy’s thoughts. The young woman was tall, wonderfully dressed, with a superb figure, tawny blond hair around a face without any real beauty, extremely lively eyes, and a good smile on her somewhat large mouth.

After a few handshakes given with a precise gesture, she took her place beside Madame Arnay and started conversing in a very concise French. Her little foreign accent gave it an exotic flavor. From all her words, as from her manners, there was a singular frankness, a total absence of coquetry or personal pretension.

“Germaine,” called Madame Arnay, “offer, if you would, a little Syracuse wine to Lady Graham. Dearest friend, oh no, don’t refuse, it's nothing, really!”

But Germaine was not where Madame Arnay thought she was. Germaine was instead occupied in the little drawing room exchanging a thousand tender farewells with one of her dear friends.

Suzy hesitated for a second, then, carried away by an irresistible impulse, she rose, placed a small silver goblet filled with the delicate wine on a tray, and went to present it to the young woman. Her heart beat strongly, just as it had been at Madame de Vricourt's during her interview.

“Oh, thank you, Suzanne,” said Madame Arnay, with her charming smile.

Lady Graham raised her eyes to Suzy, and her gaze remained fixed on the girl's face.

“What a fine girl,” Lady Graham murmured to herself. “Who is this young girl?” she asked, leaning towards Madame Arnay. “I don't remember ever seeing her here.”

“My niece, Mademoiselle Douvry.”

“Mademoiselle Douvry…Wasn't it someone by that name that you suggested I take to Cannes? You know that I still have no prospective companion in mind, and I'm ever so bored!”

Lady Graham said these last words in a slightly raised tone, so that Suzy heard them.

“Dear Madame, I really do not know how to speak to you about this. It was of my niece herself that I spoke to you. I have explained to you, I believe, the sequence of circumstances by which she could and ought to have accepted your proposal. But she has made up her mind, and in my opinion, it was the wrong decision.”

A chill passed through Suzy’s heart. She would have liked to hear no more; but, with tense nerves, she distinguished, with ruthless clarity, Madame Arnay's reply, though it had been made as an aside.

Lady Graham did not insist. But while she was taking part in the general conversation, her keen eyes were constantly going to Suzy, who talked feverishly in the circle of young girls.

For a moment their eyes met as if a magnet had drawn them towards each other.

Le rêve de Suzy is in the public domain. All original additions, including translations, illustrations and chapter summaries, are copyright © 2025 by Marriah K. Nissen and may not be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. All rights reserved.