At this moment the Princesse des Laumes, who had not been expected to
appear at Mme. de Saint-Euverte's that evening, did in fact arrive. To
shew that she did not wish any special attention, in a house to which she
had come by an act of condescension, to be paid to her superior rank, she
had entered the room with her arms pressed close to her sides, even when
there was no crowd to be squeezed through, no one attempting to get past
her; staying purposely at the back, with the air of being in her proper
place, like a king who stands in the waiting procession at the doors of a
theatre where the management have not been warned of his coming; and
strictly limiting her field of vision--so as not to seem to be advertising
her presence and claiming the consideration that was her due--to the study
of a pattern in the carpet or of her own skirt, she stood there on the
spot which had struck her as the most modest (and from which, as she very
well knew, a cry of rapture from Mme. de Saint-Euverte would extricate her
as soon as her presence there was noticed), next to Mme. de Cambremer,
whom, however, she did not know.
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