Read The Oracle Glass for Free Online Page A

she’d taken up, between her visits to the fortune-teller. Now she made weekly visits bringing alms to the sick poor at the Hôtel Dieu, the charity hospital that lay on the square near the Cathedral of Notre Dame. Lately it was all the rage, and Mother loved to be fashionable. Besides, one could meet ladies of the highest rank bandaging sores and dispensing sweets in the vast stone salles of the Hôtel Dieu; it was the next best thing to a visit to Saint-Germain or Versailles, and far more convenient.
    The charitable fit had come on shortly after Father’s creditors had seized our carriage and horses. At first, it seemed to me to be quite unlike Mother, who usually turned up her nose at beggars and gave very poor tips. But then again, it was fashionable, so she embraced her missions of charity with the same tenacious energy that preserved her salon. To still the rumors of a declining fortune, she made sure that the women of the Pasquier family were seen well dressed, with heavily laden baskets, murmuring benedictions from bed to bed with the other aristocratic angels of mercy.
    Each of us found something worthwhile in these trips. For days after, Marie-Angélique would feed on the glimpse of the Marquise of So-and-So’s beautiful ribbons, or the new hairstyle of the Countess of Such-and-Such, and I would write in my little book. I was, at the time, testing the validity of religion by using the geometric method of proof to assess the efficacy of prayer. First I wrote down the illnesses and injuries of those we visited and the likelihood of recovery of the sick persons we had seen. Then, through ingenuous questioning, I attempted to ascertain how many prayers had been offered in each case. This I did by multiplying the number of relatives by a figure of one to five, depending upon how well the person was liked by his family. Then I would write down whether or not the person outlived his prognostication. The project kept me totally content. After all, the use of ordered thinking to discover the truth is the highest occupation of humankind.
    Charity did Mother good and made her calmer. The day the carriage was taken, she had rushed shrieking about the house, then battered open the door of Father’s study, where he and I were discussing Seneca, and covered him with abuse. He looked up at her, where she stood before his armchair, and his eyes moved slowly, so slowly, with a look I’ll never forget.
    â€œMadame, I leave you to your infidelities; you leave me to my philosophers.”
    â€œYour—your stupidities, your lack of ambition—your refusal to be seen at court, to carry my petitions…your Romans have reduced me, Monsieur. They have brought me to this , and it is beyond my endurance.”
    Father spoke with utter calm: “The day I appear at court it will be to petition the King to have you shut up in a convent for your scandalous life. Go, Madame, and do not interrupt me again.” He opened his Seneca again to the place where he had left his bookmark.
    Mother stood still, all white, her eyes half closed. Then she spoke. “You are utterly tiresome ,” she said in a cold voice and withdrew from the low, book-lined room, holding the train of her pale green silk morning gown in her hand. Father sat still in his armchair, book open on his lap, and looked over his little reading glasses to watch her go with exactly the same expression with which one would regard an insect disappearing into a crack in the wall.
    After that she had vanished in a hired chair for the rest of the day. Then it was not long before she discovered charity, and all was calm again.
    But to return to our hospital visit. André Lamotte, bold and poor, swept off his hat for my sister with a flourish as we passed.
    â€œDon’t nod to him,” said Mother, turning her face away. “He is without fortune. I’ll not have you encouraging such people.” As we turned down the rue de