Universal subservience had developed in her the
selfishness natural to spoilt children, who, like kings, make a
plaything of everything that comes to hand. As yet the graces of
youth and the charms of talent hid these faults from every eye; faults
all the more odious in a woman, since she can only please by
self-sacrifice and unselfishness; but nothing escapes the eye of a
good father, and Monsieur de Fontaine often tried to explain to his
daughter the more important pages of the mysterious book of life. Vain
effort! He had to lament his daughter's capricious indocility and
ironical shrewdness too often to persevere in a task so difficult as
that of correcting an ill-disposed nature. He contented himself with
giving her from time to time some gentle and kind advice; but he had
the sorrow of seeing his tenderest words slide from his daughter's
heart as if it were of marble. A father's eyes are slow to be
unsealed, and it needed more than one experience before the old
Royalist perceived that his daughter's rare caresses were bestowed on
him with an air of condescension. She was like young children, who
seem to say to their mother, "Make haste to kiss me, that I may go to
play." In short, Emilie vouchsafed to be fond of her parents. But
often, by those sudden whims, which seem inexplicable in young girls,
she kept aloof and scarcely ever appeared; she complained of having to
share her father's and mother's heart with too many people; she was
jealous of every one, even of her brothers and sisters.
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