A man was standing close behind Gabrielle’s chair in an attitude of excessive humility. He bowed low and spread out his hands as she turned to him, while an expressive curl of contempt drew down the corners of Lucette’s mouth. “What is it? Why did you not say you were here?” asked Gabrielle sharply. “I feared to interrupt miladi, and was awaiting your permission to speak my errand.” His voice was soft and his manner deferential. “What is it? Speak.” “My master, the Baron de Proballe, desires to know if it is convenient for him to wait upon you, miladi?” “My uncle? Certainly. Where is he?” “At present in his apartments, miladi.” “Tell him I will see him at once.” “I am miladi’s most humble servant,” was the reply with another deep bow, as he went. “What a loathsome snake is that Master Dauban,” exclaimed Lucette, looking after him. “My uncle says he is a very honest fellow and as faithful as a man can be.” “I should need a higher character than that,” said Lucette with another very expressive shrug. “The Baron de Proballe is my uncle, Lucette,” replied Gabrielle in a tone of reproach, as she rose to go into the house. And Lucette, by way of reply, turned her head away with a toss and made a grimace to herself as she bent over her wheel. CHAPTER III SINISTER HINTS Scarcely had Gabrielle left the terrace before Lucette’s wheel stopped and she began to think instead of work. Little frowns and smiles chased each other alternately across her dark expressive face, and here even pearly teeth showed ever and again between the full, mobile lips. “Has the day’s adventure changed everything?” she mused. “He seems to have been very handsome, this gallant cavalier. I wonder. It would be a hard fight. I know how her pride can stand like a fortress; and I know how love can pull and pull and pull. Don’t I know it?” and she smiled and sighed in turn. “Poor Gabrielle! What a struggle! Heart whispers, ‘I love him’; pride answers, ‘My pledge is given.’ Ah me! he will have to be a manly man, as she says, if he will win her. But she will have a traitor in the fortress after all, if she really love him. Ah me! I know how it would end with me. But Gabrielle--well, she is Gabrielle.” At that moment a frown chased away the smiles, for Master Dauban, the man she had dubbed a snake, came out from the Maison and approached her. He was one of those creatures on whom nature sets the outward marks of his inward character. His whole appearance and manner suggested slyness and secretiveness. His light brown shifty eyes were deep set in his sallow face, his cheeks smooth and round, and his lips thin and straight; while his voice, unctuous and oily, and his glances, always quick and restlessly furtive, no less than the fawning gestures of his hands and his soft tread proclaimed him a born spy. At least so Lucette thought, and she hated him accordingly, as she hated all things mean and base.