"O Monsieur!" replied Colombe, covered with confusion, "your lovely things will probably be always unfamiliar to me, or at least useless. I live in solitude and obscurity, and so far is it from being the case that the solitude and obscurity are oppressive to me, that I confess that I love them, I confess that I would like to live here always, and yet I also confess that I would like well to see your jewels, not for myself but for them,--not to wear them, but to admire them." Trembling with fear lest she had said too much, and perhaps with a longing to say even more, Colombe bowed and left the room so swiftly, that to the eyes of a man more knowing in such matters her exit would have worn the aspect of a flight. "Well, well!" exclaimed Dame Perrine; "that's not a long way from something like coquetry. There is no doubt, young man, that you talk like a book. Yes, yes, one can but believe that you Italians have secret means of fascinating people. No stronger proof is needed than this,--that you have enlisted me on your side at once, and 'pon honor, I find myself wishing that Messire le Prévôt will not deal too hardly with you. _Au revoir_, young man, and bid your master be on his guard. Warn him that Messire d'Estourville is as hard of heart as the devil, and wields great influence at court. For which reason, if your master will take my advice, he will abandon all thought of living at the Grand-Nesle, and especially of taking forcible possession of it. As for you--but we shall see you again, shall we not? Above all, do not believe Colombe; the property of her deceased mother is sufficient to enable her to indulge in baubles twenty times more costly than those you offer her. And look you, bring also some less elaborate articles; it may occur to her to make me a little present. I am not yet, thank God! so old that I need decline a little flirtation. You understand, do you not?" Deeming it necessary, the better to make her meaning clear, to enforce her words with a gesture, she laid her hand upon the young man's arm. Ascanio jumped like one suddenly awakened from a sound sleep. Indeed, it seemed to him as if it were all a dream. He could not realize that he was under Colombe's roof, and he doubted whether the white apparition whose melodious voice was still whispering in his ear, whose slender form had just vanished from his sight, was really she for one glance from whose eyes he would have given his life that morning. Overflowing with his present happiness and his future prospects, he promised Dame Perrine whatever she wished, without even listening to what she asked him to do. What mattered it to him? Was he not ready to give all that he possessed to see Colombe once more? Thinking that to prolong his visit would be unbecoming, he took leave of Dame Perrine, promising to return the next day.