Explore "The Cake" by Guy de Maupassant on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
We will call her Madame Anserre though it was not her real name.
She was one of those Parisian comets who leave a sort of trail of fire behind them. She wrote poetry and short stories, was sentimental and ravishingly beautiful. Her circle was small and consisted only of exceptional people -- those generally known as the kings of this, that, or the other. To be invited to her receptions stamped one as a person of intelligence; let us say that her invitations were appreciated for this reason. Her husband played the part of an obscure satellite: to be married to a star is no easy role. This husband had, however, a brilliant idea, that of creating a State within a State, of possessing some value in himself although only of secondary importance: he received on the same day as his wife did and had his special set who listened to him and appreciated his qualities, paying much more attention to him than they did to his brilliant companion.