Edith Wharton

Madame de Treymes Edith Wharton

His European visits were infrequent enough to have kept unimpaired thefreshness of his eye, and he was always struck anew by the vast and consummatelyordered spectacle of Paris: by its look of having been boldly and deliberatelyplanned as a background for the enjoyment of life, instead of being forced intogrudging concessions to the festive instincts, or barricading itself against them inunenlightened ugliness, like his own lamentable New York. But to-day, if the scene had never presented itself more alluringly, in that moistspring bloom between showers, when the horse-chestnuts dome themselves inunreal green against a gauzy sky, and the very dust of the pavement seems thefragrance of lilac made visible-to-day for the first time the sense of a personalstake in it all, of having to reckon individually with its effects and influences, keptDurham from an unrestrained yielding to the spell. Paris might still be-to theunimplicated it doubtless still was-the most beautiful city in the world; butwhether it were the most lovable or the most detestable depended for him, in thelast analysis, on the buttoning of the white glove over which Fanny de Malrive stilllingered.