The year comprising these studies and this new freedom ended
sadly with the death of her grandmother.
And now, her real protectress being removed, the discords of life broke
in upon her, and asserted themselves. Scarcely was the beloved form
cold, when Aurore's mother arrived, to wake the echoes of the chateau
with wild abuse of its late mistress. By testamentary disposition,
Madame Dupin had made Aurore her heir, and had named two of her own
relatives as guardians; but the mother now insisted on her own rights,
and, after much acrimonious dispute and comment, carried Aurore from her
beloved solitudes to her own quarters in Paris,--a journey of sorrow,
and the beginning of sorrows. In her childhood Aurore had often longed
for this mother's breast as her natural refuge, and the true home of her
childish affections. But it "was one of those characters of self-will
and passion which deteriorate in later life, and in which no new moral
beauties spring up to replace the impulsive graces of youth. Regarding
Aurore now as the work of another's hands, she made her the victim of
ceaseless and causeless petulance. Her gross abuse of her mother-in-law
gave Aurore many tears to shed in private, while her persecution of poor
Deschartres drove her daughter to the expedient of shielding him--with
a lie.
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