chunk: Realizing after three years of unhappiness that her marriage is falling apart and having been informed by a malicious gossip of Théodore's attachment to the duchess, Augustine visits Madame de Carigliano not to ask her to give her back her husband's heart but to learn the arts by which it has been captured. The duchess warns her against trying to conquer a man's heart through love, which will only allow the husband to tyrannize over the wife; instead a woman must use all the arts of coquetry that nature puts at her disposal. Augustine is shocked to learn that Madame de Carigliano sees marriage as a form of warfare. The duchess then returns to Augustine her own portrait, telling her that if she cannot conquer her husband with this weapon, she is not a woman.