University of Virginia Library

27. CHAPTER XXVII.

It was some time before poor Alice, despite of all appliances, returned to her senses;
and had it not been for the prudence of Madame de Gondi—who would not suffer Master
Selby to be disturbed; and who, on one pretence or other, kept Margaret, Alice's
faithful girl, out of the room, retaining her own woman who could not speak or understand
one word of English, in which tongue she was well assured her cousin would
speak, when she recovered—there would have been a terrible confusion, and the whole
matter would have been bruited to the household. At length, when her beautiful form
had been released from all the ligatures that confined it, her temples bathed with cold
water, and stimulating essences applied, she stretched out her arms, heaved a long
breath, and opened her fair eyes, but with that bewildered and unconscious expression,
which shows the senses to be absent, although the life may have returned. In a moment
or two, indeed, they reclosed for a little space; but, when she opened them again, it
was with a calm and more intelligent glance; and she pressed her cousin's hand,
saying,

“I shall be better in a little while—do not be frightened—and pray do not tell my
father.”

“Oh, no, indeed!” replied Madame de Gondi; “he has been long in bed, and all
our guests have gone, and the house is quite quiet. He need not know anything about
the matter; why should he? It was only the fatigue of travelling and the heat of the
room.”

A faint and sickly smile crossed the pale lips of Alice, and she half shook her head;
but her cousin, although she well knew what she meant, was resolved not to understand
her; and after remaining with her till the night was far advanced toward morning, and
seeing her fall into a natural and quiet sleep, she left her to the care of Margaret, saying,
She doubted not she would be quite well to-morrow.

The following morning rose bright and joyous; and Alice, as Madame de Gondi had
foretold, was perfectly well as regards the mere health of the body, and was astir before
the earliest. For when Henriette, who herself had risen some hours before her wonted
time, anxious about her lovely guest, entered the chamber, she found her sitting fully
dressed by the window, with her head leaning on her hand in a disconsolate mood; the
maiden Margaret, quite overdone with watching, outstretched in deep sleep on a sofa
by the bed which her mistress had so long deserted.

“Oh, my dear Alice, I am so glad to see you up, and well again!” exclaimed her
cousin, as she entered; “I was afraid you might still feel some remains of your indisposition.”

“No! oh, no!” answered poor Alice; “but I am sure I need not tell you that I was
not indisposed at all.”

“You love him, then?” said Henriette, but rather in a tone of question, than of
positive affirmation—“you do then love this Captain Wyvil? I feared so from the
first!”

“I saw you had my secret, cousin, and I am but a poor dissembler; besides, I am
sure you will never speak of what I tell you; and in good truth I want the support of
a female adviser. I do love him.”

“And he?” asked Henriette.

“Is my affianced husband; troth-plighted, in the presence of my father!” Alice
replied.

Madame de Gondi started in vehement surprise; for she had, until that moment, no
possible idea that matters had gone on to such a length—and she paused a little while
before she made any answer; but at last said, “I would be loath, my sweet Alice, to
raise hopes—or, I should rather say, renew hopes—in your mind, which may but lead
in the end to disappointment; but it appears to me that this makes all the difference.
At first I fancied this was but a girlish preference of yours—I did not even know that
he returned it.”

“Madame de Gondi!” interrupted Alice, her pale face, and her whole neck and
bosom suffused with burning blushes, as she spoke in a tone of grave disappointment;
“and did you think so meanly of poor Alice Selby, as to deem that she would give
her love unsought?”

“Indeed, indeed!” answered Henriette, “I never thought at all of Alice Selby, but
as one, who was all maidenly modesty and virtue; but, trust me, dearest one, our love
is not always our own to give—nor does it always wait for asking. But suffer me to
finish what I was about to say; that, fancying this to be only a girlish fancy, I doubted
much the wisdom of that fancy; seeing, beyond doubt, that this Captain Wyvil is
somewhat famous for gallantry, and has been paying much attention to this Mademoi,
selle Oswald. But since you tell me that it is gone so far, I begin to believe we have
been too hasty. It is extremely likely that all this has been mere levity; that flattered
and amused by the evident liking of a very pretty woman, he has allowed himself to
be led, as a sort of fashionable victim, both parties well understanding one another:
for, I need not tell you, dear Alice, that although there may be the same depth, there is
by no means the same singleness of love in the men as in us women; and that full
many a man who really is in love, and that constantly and truly with one woman,
deems it no flaw in his allegiance to make love to another—merely to pass the time, or
to amuse himself in the absence of his mistress. Therefore we must not be too quick
in judging—this Paris is a great place for flirting and scandal; and it is very likely
that there may be no truth in this at all. But if there were—if he should prove so vile
and infamous a traitor; you do not love him so much, Alice, that your pride would not
come to your rescue, and that you would not shake him off, as a thing too worthless
for a moment's lamentation?”

“Alas! dear lady,” answered poor Alice with a sigh, “should it be so, indeed he
would have robbed me of all the friendship of my soul; he would have heaped my
heart with the ashes of consumed hope and happiness; he would have covered my
young days with desolation; he would have taken from me that best boon of nature—
confidence in the truth of our fellows—but, lady, but—” and she paused, unable to
complete the sentence; and Henriette took it up—

“But you would love him no more—is it not so, dear Alice?”

“As woman loves but once,” she answered, clasping her hands together, “I love
him, and that for ever!”

“A very, very, woman!” replied Madame de Gondi, with a smile; “neither is our
task an easy one—we have to learn, in the first place, whether this be not all a mere
evanescent fancy; and, in the second, if the wild bird's wings have been lured from its
true owner by honied words, to win him back again to his allegiance. My life on it!
and these bright sunny locks, and soft blue eyes, will wake him to his senses in a
moment, if he have strayed somewhat in your absence. Gratitude, honor, faith, all
bind him to your footstool. Besides, you are fairer by one half than she, and twenty
times more feminine; then think what the proverb says of old—`Ou revient toujours
as ses premiers amours.' Oh, be sure, Alice, if this bright Isabella Oswald has won him
for a moment, you shall retrieve him yet more easily than you have lost him.”

“I would die sooner than attempt it;” answered Alice, coloring high, and speaking
loud with the energy of indignation. “I win him back! I stoop to win that which is
mine already! I humble myself to receive back a pledge which he has forfeited! No!
Henriette de Gondi, no! whom Alice Selby marries she must not only love, but respect,
and esteem, and honor! Love him? alas for me! I shall, and oh! how deeply—even
to my dying day—pray for his happiness, and well-being, and honor; but never could
I respect, or esteem, or honor one whose heart could swerve, or whose faith falter!”

“What would you do then, Alice,” asked her cousin, almost crying between sympathy
and excitement “what would you do, my sweet Alice?”

“Pray God to give me strength to bear my sorrows meekly—and bear them, and
perhaps—die Henriette.”

She raised her voice with the last words so loudly, that Margaret was aroused; and

starting up from the sofa, she exclaimed, as she rubbed her eyes, “Coming—I'm coming,
Mistress Alice. Did you call?”

So near are the founts of tears and laughter, that, sad although she was, and grieved
at heart, Madame de Gondi could not refrain from smiling at the air half-bewildered,
half-terrified, half-stupid, of the English maiden, when she beheld her mistress risen
from her bed and dressed without her assistance; and in a moment Alice joined in the
mirth which her quaint excuses and apologies called forth, although it was but for a
second, when she relapsed into her usual repose of air and manner.

“We will talk more of this hereafter, Alice,” said the other. “Meanwhile, let Margaret
arrange your hair, and hurry down to breakfast; for Master Selby, I doubt not,
is even now awaiting us.” And with a word she left the bedchamber; and Alice, with
that strong mastery of her passions that formed so prominent a feature in her character,
composed herself so thoroughly, that no one could have dreamed that a few short minutes
before her heart had been rent by the most violent emotions. It was not long
before she joined her friends at the breakfast table; and when she did so, although she
certainly was a little pale, she conversed cheerfully and even gayly, and that too without
any expression of the forced merriment, which it is so painful even to witness. Old
Selby was in one of his brightest of moods; having quite shaken off his abstraction,
and talking with much real interest about some of the great scholars of the day, with
whom he was desirous of becoming intimate, and with whom Madame de Gondi promised
to make him speedily acquainted. “Indeed,” she said, in conclusion of some little
offer of the kind, “I had thought of this already. We had a little supper here last
night, of which I did not speak to you, fearing that you would be so ceremonious as to
do what I knew would be disagreeable to your health; and I engaged the good old
Bishop of Lisieux, who is himself a man of talent, to call on you to-day, and take you
to see our famous Pierre Huet, and several others of the academicians.”

“You are, indeed, most kind and thoughtful,” he replied. “I myself know Pierre
Huet; at least, we have corresponded on subjects of mutual interest, and I feel quite as
if we were old friends.”

“Yes, indeed;” interposed Alice, laughing so naturally that Henriette gazed at her
with amazement, “my father used to write him long letters, and a work beginning,
`Mon cher Huet—Lycophron, in the 367th line of his Cassan dra, has the word so and
so, the mystic sense of which,' and so on—whole pages full of stuff that no one in the
world could understand, without one intelligible word, till you came to servitcur tres
humble. And Monsieur Huet used to reply: `Mon ami Selby—Camillus and Decius
Junius Brutus were not so foolish as people have imagined, men, but merely fresh developments
of the mythic personage variously represented as Ulysses and Agamemnon
and Prometheus; just in the same manner as Tarquinia, Medea, Helen, Semiramis,
Omphale, and in short all the women mentioned in mythologies, are new types of the
witch of Endor!' These are exactly the kind of letters they used to write, upon my
honor. And now my dear father talks about his knowing the man; and he cannot tell
whether he is rich or poor, old or young, well-intentioned, or the worst of men.”

“Well, that is true; that is true at least,” answered Selby, smiling—“although all
that stuff about the letters is an exaggeration of Alice's, and quite untrue moreover, for
Huet never could have made such blunders as to say Ulysses and Prometheus were one
person—although it may be very clearly shown that the mystic personage, Orion—”

“For heaven's sake, dearest father,” Alice interrupted him, “do not waste these
most excellent, and I have no doubt, valuable discoveries, on minds so incapable and
ignorant as mine and Madame de Gondi's.”

“Upon my word! I do think you were wiser to reserve them for the good Bishop, or
Pierre Huet,” Henriette chimed in, with a silvery laugh; and the old student was compelled
to join in the merriment, excited by his own eccentricity.

Soon afterwards, almost indeed before the covers had been removed, and while they
were yet lingering in the breakfast room, the worthy bishop was announced; and after
a short conversation with the ladies, carried off the high-minded and unworldly scholar,

apparantly delighted at finding a person, of pursuits and a spirit so congenial. Then,
quietly resuming their previous conversation, Madame de Gondi advised her young
friend, very wisely, neither to do or resolve anything hastily.

“I think I can see,” she said, “already, though I have known you for so short a
time, enough of your character to be sure that the happiness of your whole life is at
stake; and that is not to be cast away on slight or mistaken causes. Moreover, to you,
who are I know so fraught with conscious and religious scruples, it should be no small
indncement to calm and deliberate judgment, that the happiness of another is probably
involved equally with your own; and, above all things, I entreat you to remember, what
I have learned by a life's experience, that the constancy of men and of women are very
different things. A man may act—nay, often does act, while he is perfectly true to his
first love, exactly as it would argue a woman utterly false to do.”

“Oh, yes,” said Alice, “I know that; and I have too much cause for wishing all
to go on well, to suffer myself to be rash or indiscreet in this case, even if I were naturally
inclined to do so, which, I think, I am not.”

“I am sure not,” said Henriette; “and you will have abundant opportunities of
judging, for you will meet him everywhere, and that too, in company with this lady,
who is considered very beautiful. And now that I begin to recollect, I think still more
that there is nothing in this; for I remember hearing that Major Wyvil and Monsieur
de Bellechassaigne performed a very valiant exploit, in saving this girl and her father
from some of the Duke of Lorraine's soldiers; I fancy it will only prove to be gratitude
and friendship. But here is the carriage, I perceive at the door; I want to take you
around to some of our gay shops, to the perfumer's, and the jeweller's, and fifty other
pleasant places, excellent for getting rid of superfluous money; and after dinner we
will go and walk in the gardens of the Tuileries, which is quite the mode nowadays;
and I dare say the king will be there, and the queen-mother likewise.”

The morning passed pleasantly away, although, to say the truth, the heart of Alice
was far away from the gay scenes through which she passed; nor were her thoughts
to be diverted by the rich laces of the Low Countries, the silver fringed gloves of Bruges,
the silks already famous of Lyons and Tours, and the thousand other gay and splendid
wares, which, irresistible to female eyes, were everywhere displayed to tempt her.

The noonday meal was ended; and happy ever at witnessing the happiness of those
dear to her, Alice was gayer when she witnessed the delight of her father, at the mode
in which he had spent the morning, and at an engagement he had made to pass the
afternoon in visiting some library, full of rare manuscripts, and dim illegible papyri,
than she had fancied she could ever be again; for, though she would not suffer herself
to despond, she had by no means succeeded in persuading herself, as Madame de
Gondi had half done, that Marmaduke was true and faithful; but, on the contrary,
there was a heavy cloud continually overcasting her brighter anticipations; one of
those almost causeless shadows, which all of us, even the least imaginative, at times
have experienced, and which even the least superstitious half believe to be ominous of
coming evil. Soon after dinner, the carriage was again announced; and splendidly
dressed in the superb and stately fashion of the day, with the small hoop or vertugardin,
as it was sometimes called—not the absurd monstrosity of later days—lending a graceful
contour to the hips, and setting off the slender waist, displayed to advantage by the
long corsage; with satin robes looped up with knots of gold or silver ribbons, to show
the petticoat of some rich tissue; and long brocaded trains gracefully carried over the
left arms; with their long soft hair trained to fall in luxuriant ringlets over the neck
and shoulders, the ladies set forth to walk in the palace gardens. Those gardens,
sumptuous though they were and beautiful, were by no means what they are now; for
at that time the changes which sprang from the exquisite taste of the great Colbert had
not as yet been made, although they were commenced only a few years later; and, in
the days of which I write, the gardens were divided by a small narrow street -not
eleaner than streets usually were in Paris—from the palace to which they belonged;
and were flanked on the river side by a range of mean and insignificant houses, which

appeared to belong to the royal residence, and detracted sadly from the dignity of the
view. The magnificent terrace, on the water's side, had not then been constructed,
nor the great basins and superb water-works, which now form so great a portion of the
altractions of the place. They were, however, even then, the finest gardens in the
world; and Alice, who had been accustomed only to the natural, and inartificial shrubberies
and parks of her native land, could not but be struck by the superb and shadowed
avenues, the long rows of pleached hedges, solid and high as walls of yew, or box, or
hornbeam; by the secluded mazes cut in the massive greenery, the sheltered seats, and
pleasant arbors, the urns and vases, columns and statues which decorated every open
place; and by the fountains which, though far less noble than the jets which now
adorn those princely gardens, sparkled and flashed with bright prismatic colors, unrivalled
in the clear autumn sunshine. The gardens were already crowded with the
fair, and great, and noble, when Henriette de Gondi and Alice, leaving their carriage at
the splendid gates of gilded-iron work, guarded by two tall sentinels in the magnificent
and gaudy costume of the Swiss guard, entered the principal avenue. Hundreds of
gentlemen in gay court-dresses, or rich uniforms sparkling with gold and gems, and
fluttering with scarfs and ribbons, and broad laces, were strolling to and fro, in groups
or singly; perfuming all the air with the rich scents which were scattered from their
waving locks; for the abominable fashion of perukes had not as yet been introduced,
and all their heads were bare, as well in compliment to the ladies, many of whom
enlivened the bright scene yet farther by their graceful presence, as in deference to the
young king, who was known to be within the precincts of the garden. Scarcely had
they made a dozen steps into the garden, before they were recognized and joined by
several of the gentlemen who had supped with them on the previous evening, and who
appeared determined to lose no opportunity of attaching themselves to the train of one,
whose beauty, they foresaw, would elevate her to the rank of a reigning beile in the court
of the young and beauty-loving monarch. Light, gay, and sparkling was the conversation
of the gay youths, mingled with many a jest and racy anecdote of this or that
great personage, who passed or repassed constantly. This was the splendid and voluptuous
Fouquet, the celebrated minister of the finance, who, though his fall was not far
distant, still basked in the meridian favor of the boy-monarch—that was Count Anthony
Hamilton, the wittiest man, where almost all were witty—and that superb and gallant
cavalier, who walked beside him jesting and laughing noisily, all blazing with inesti
mable diamonds, that was the Count de Grammont; and his appearance recalled some
recent bon-mot, which was of course retailed—and thus, almost despite herself, between
the interest of seeing so many noted persons, and the gay repartees and jeux de mot
which were continually flowing round her, Alice was rapidly forgetting her griefs,
when she was suddenly called back to them by a group of persons of both sexes, which
met them and swept onward in a moment, scarce noticing if they saw the young English
beauty. The first person, who walked a step or two in advance of the rest, and was
covered, was a young man well made, and not ungraceful; and with a natural air of
dignity, which was not altogether destroyed by the unpleasant expression and hard features
of his dark-complexioned, strongly-lined, and saturnine countenance. His hair
was harsh and coarse, of a deep black; and his eyes, which were quick and expressive,
were of the same color. It was remarkable, that the son of two among the handsomest
persons in Europe should have been so ungainly, yet so it was; for it was Charles the
Second, an exile from the land of his fathers, and a pensioner on the French king's
bounty, who passed by, laughing indecently and boisterously at some licentious joke,
which had just fallen from the lips of Buckingham or Wilmot, both of whom walked
almost beside him, although a step or two behind. Several other English gentlemen
accompanied the thankless Master, for whom they had bled and were now in banishment,
and three or four ladies; but it was on the last of these, a tall and very beautiful
girl, with a high and perhaps some what bold style of loveliness, a profusion of magnificent
black ringlets, a shape of exquisite voluptuous symmetry, and the unrivalled gait,
springy yet slow, and blithe and graceful, of a Castilian lady, that the quick eye of
Alice rested. It was the same girl who had ridden past the carriage just as they
reached the gates of Paris on the preceding day, and her heart told her in a moment
that it was Isabella Oswald—and it was she; superbly habited in a rich robe of emerald
velvet slashed with white satin, and decorated with slight chainwork of wrought gold,
with diamonds in her bosom, and in her splendid hair—nothing could be more queenly
than the whole air and carriage of the proud beauty, as she passed along leaning upon
the arm of the tall gray-haired soldier, whom she had addressed the previous day, as
her father.

“See, see; Mademoiselle de Selby,” exclaimed the young count de Bellefonds in a
loud whisper, as she swept along.

“That is the heroine of Villequier's tale last evening—that handsome black haired
girl.”

“Indeed!” said Alice quietly, “she is extremely handsome certainly; I do not wonder
that the gentlemen should be somewhat bold to win her.”

“Nor I, nor I,” replied Bellefonds; “but, as I thought at the time, there was a good
deal of romance in our worthy captain's story—the quarrel had nothing to do in the
world with the lady, it was merely about some military duty or other. The old man is
a very rigid disciplinarian, and is blest with a fiery temper; and was intemperate and
violent in his language. Wyvil—what singular names, by the by, you English people
have; it is almost impossible to speak them—behaved extremely well and coolly; and
all is well arranged, and they are friends again!”

“Oh! I am glad to hear that,” replied Alice, as if she had been quite unconcerned —
“I am very glad to hear that Major Wyvil conducted himself so well. He is an old
friend of ours, although I have not seen him since I have been in Paris.”

“Ah! you will see him very soon; he is a great favorite at court, one of the bravest
and most noble of our young officers—I dare say he is in the garden now; but ha!
what have we here?” he added, as a considerable bustle might be observed a little
farther up the walk, the people hurrying to and fro, and arranging themselves in lines
on either hand, “there is a movement.” As if in answer to the count's question, there
came a cry, “The king! the king! room for the king!” and bowing courteously to
all his subjects, and pausing now and then to speak to some one of the more distinguished,
the young and splendid prince came slowly down the avenue, attended by a
band of courtiers as gallantly attired as can be fancied. Louis, who was at this time
little advanced beyond the ripening term of boyhood, was singularly, ay, wonderfully
handsome—not very tall, but splendidly proportioned, with a fine brilliant countenance
of somewhat Roman outline; a forehead all bland expanse, yet broad and massive, an
eye bright, penetrating and undaunted as the eagle's; a lip which could express an
empire's proud authority, but which was now wreathed in a sweet and fascinating
smile; a gait, at the same time easy and majestic; an air, so wonderfully winning, that
when he chose it, no one on earth could resist its imperative seduction—such, at that
period was the youth, whose name was to be coupled for all ages with everything that
relates to magnificence and grandeur, whether of war and glory, or of pleasure and
ostentation; who certainly possessed beyond all others the regal power of winning hearts
as it were by a word, of gaining almost by a glance man's adoration—woman's deep
devotion. Of all the court, there was no man so plainly dressed as the young monarch;
he wore his own rich chestnut hair in flowing ringlets, a coat of black velvet, lined with
white satin, with vest and breeches of the same material, without a particle of lace, or
embroidery, or chain of gold, or jewelry, or any other decoration, except a single star of
superb brilliants on the left breast of the doublet, a pair of diamond buckles in his
shoes, and a diamond hilt to his court rapier. His eye glanced rapidly from side to
side, as he came up the walk, dwelling for a few moments complacently upon any face
of more than ordinary beauty; and when he had come to the spot where Madame de
Gondi stood, he came to a dead stop, looking full at Alice Selby. “Ha!” he said,
“our fair lady of Gondi, methinks you have a new face there! one that we nave not
seen at our court—one of the fair daughters of the noble house of Retz?”

“Not so, sire;” answered Henriette de Gondi, curtseying very low at this unexpected
civility. “A young English lady, a cousin of my dear mother's, who has been
forced to fly from her country in consequence of loyalty to her king—Mademoiselle
Selby—I had proposed to ask permission to present her to your majesty on your next
reception-day: she only arrived in your majesty's capital last evening.”

“We shall be happy always to receive so loyal and so fair a lady,” answered Louis,
very gracefully; “our lady mother also, will be glad to see Mistress Selby;” and he
was already moving onward, when he appeared to recollect something, and turning
short round, “I presume,” he said, “you have received our commands, madame, through
our lord chamberlain, to attend our ball this evening at the Louvre?”

“I have not heard of it, sire,” she replied, when he interrupted her—

“Artagrac, then, must have forgotten; well, now you comprehend, and your fair
cousin will accompany you;” and with these words, the ladies curtseying low in token
of assent, the monarch and his train swept onward, the former saying so loud that his
words reached the ears of Alice—“Ma foi! Beaugen, these English girls eclipse the
brightest of our beauties—I thought the Oswald the handsomest woman I had ever seen,
but this fair-haired girl is twenty times more lovely.”

A well-pleased smile came over the face of Henriette, as she heard the flattering
comment of the king, well knowing that so open an expression of his admiration, would
send the whole world of the court to worship at the feet of Alice; and hoping that a
reception so distinguished would go far to reclaim the recreant lover. Alice smiled
likewise, but it was with a sad and calm expression that spoke of anything rather than
gratified vanity or pride. The gentlemen around did not, however, seem to notice either
the smile, or the feelings that gave birth to it; but continued their attentions for some
time, strolling the while along the shadowy walks, and pausing now and then by the
basin of some brilliant fountain, until, having remained as long as politeness would
permit, one by one, all of them dropped off, pleading some business or engagement as
an excuse, and only Bellefonds, who was indeed related to the house of Gondi, felt it
his duty to await their pleasure. After a while—“well Alice,” said her cousin, “I
think we have had enough of this—if Monsieur de Bellefonds will be so good as to
inquire for my carriage at the gate, we will sit down and wait for his return in this quiet
arbor.” The place of which she spoke, was no more than a nook, or green recess,
hollowed out of the massive thickness of a great yew hedge, with a seat capable of
accommodating two, or at the most, three persons, overlooking the principal jet d'eau,
and the great carre four, or common centre from which the several avenues diverged
The gentleman bowed, and walked quickly off toward the gate of the Tuileries, and
the two ladies sat down in the shade, neither of them for the moment much inclined to
talk—for there is a reaction which follows the excitement of very forced and brilliant
conversation, as surely as it does the excitement of any other kind; and a sort of vagne
lassitude had crept over both of them, inclining them rather to think within themselves,
than to speak of what had been passing. It happened to be the case, however, that the
same hedge in which the sylvan seat was framed where they were sitting, was the
external boundary of a maze or labyrinth, laid out with rare skill and many intricate
and doubtful windings; and exactly behind the spot where Alice sat, another similar
recess had been cut, in the thickness of the same hedge, opening to the walk behind;
and only separated from the bower in front by a few inches of thick evergreen foliage,
sufficient indeed to prevent the eye from discerning anything beyond, but suffering
every word that was spoken to pass through its leafy screen. This seat, the existence
of which had been suspected by neither of the ladies, was unoccupied when they first
sat down; but scarcely had they been there a minute when they distinguished the foot
steps of two persons, one evidently a lady, coming along the walk behind them, and
immediately afterwards became aware that they had paused almost beside them. A
moment afterwards the sweet and low-toned voice of a woman was heard saying, “Oh!
this is very wrong—I fear, that this is very wrong indeed—what will my father say
when he misses me, and finds that you have come off with me?”

“Say? why, what should he say, sweet Isabella?” answered a man, in tones, each
note of which struck to the very heart of Alice, “but that you are a wild one ever,
and ran away into the maize, and that I came to seek for you, lest you should lose your
way. But, Isabel, it is not you, but I, that have indeed strayed from my road: and if
you will not deign to lead me back, I fear me, I am lost for ever. Beautiful, beautiful
Isabella—listen one moment—nay! do not turn your head away, nor beat the earth so
proudly angry with that small foot—listen, for I must speak. I cannot be confined, and
cribbed, and fettered by their confounded rules of convenance; and I must speak, and
be answered. I adore you! words cannot speak my adoration, and you know it. Yes,
well you know it, Isabella, and you have smiled on me, and seemed not wholly to
despise my suit. Speak then—speak, Isabella, and say—can you not love me, will you
not be mine?”

The moment she had recognized the voice, Alice grasped Henriette by the arm so
rigidly, that instantly she comprehended what was passing; and when her cousin would
have risen, detained her quietly, yet by a hold so firm that she could not escape from
it without creating so much noise as would have reached the ears of the others. A
second or two followed, before any answer was returned by the girl; and there was a
sound, that might have been either that of weeping or of suppressed laughter; but when
she spoke, her voice was clear and silvery, and, if anything, pitched somewhat higher
than before.

“Yes,” she said, “Major Wyvil, I will be quite frank with you. I have perceived
your attentions—nay, chafe not! your love, if you will—and I will not say that I have
perceived them altogether with indifference; but, ere I give my love, I must be certain,
and I am not quite certain. Sir, I have heard something whispered of love passages in
England—something of a fair girl who rescued Captain Wyvil from strange peril, and
loved and was loved in return. Methinks—”

“Mere talk,” Marmaduke answered, interrupting her; “mere empty idle slander!
uttered by fools who know not, or knaves who care not what they publish. Nay,
dearest, loveliest Isabella, I swear to you that my whole heart is yours—yours only—
and for ever! Why, she! she was the merest country girl! I never so much even as
thought of her—”

“Enough!” whispered Alice, vehemently—“I will hear no more;” and, starting to
her feet, she hurried out of the little arbor before Henriette had time to hinder her, and
went on speaking, when she joined her, not without manifesting strong indignation—
“I am astonished at you—ay, astonished, Madame de Gondi—that you should wish
me to remain and hear things not intended for my ears: it is unprincipled and base—”

“Alice,” interposed Henriette—“Alice, you are now angry, and very naturally so.
The time will come, however, when you will do me justice. I am the last, the very
last person, Alice, who would encourage any one to listen meanly to the words of
another; but in this case you had unwittingly heard so much, that it was absolutely
necessary that you should hear more. But you are right in this—you have heard all
that it behooved you to hear; you have detected and shall foil a villain! And, as you
say, we had no right to wait or listen for the lady's answer. Now take my arm—here
comes de Bellefonds to announce the carriage—and see, the gardens are already
almost empty.”