Dispelled was the artificial fabric of their dream of a love that was as old as life itself--dispelled the poetic figment that they were in the honeymoon of a young pure union of the heart! These three children told a tale of Pilar in which Wilhelm bore no part, and the chapters of that story bore different names, as did the children themselves.
Pilar divined easily enough what was passing in Wilhelm's mind at sight of the children.

She never let them come to the house again, but henceforth went to see them at their respective homes.

He was sure that they liked coming to the Boulevard Pereire, and was sorry that they should miss this pleasure on his account.

Pilar begged him, however, not to allude to the subject again--he was dearer to her than her children, and there was nothing she would not do to spare him a moment's unpleasantness.
The first visitor whom Wilhelm saw in Pilar's house was a little tubby gentleman with a clean-shaven face and a rosette in his buttonhole, composed of sixteen different colored ribbons at the very lowest computation.

He enjoyed the privilege of coming at any hour of the day, and being instantly admitted to the boudoir.