The Regent had been traversing the throng of revellers with Madame de Parabére on his arm; the latter, proud of her disgrace, and exulting in her infamous position as his acknowledged mistress, had bared her face, in order to receive the full tribute of admiration which her beauty really deserved. Now, while the Duke stood still for a moment, and exchanged a few jesting compliments and well-bred sarcasms with the passing maskers, an encounter in which he acquitted himself with considerable tact and ingenuity, his companion, dearly loving mischief, turned all her batteries on Captain George. The Marquise was, therefore, left planted as one too many; a situation to which she, the spoiled child of society, was so unaccustomed, that she could have cried with vexation, but for the revenge now literally within her grasp. So she peered, and watched, and waited, like a Grey Musketeer skirmishing. Madame de Parabére, observing the Regent’s attention engaged elsewhere, whispered something to George, looking insolently the while at his companion, and laughed. Then the Marquise primed her weapon, as it were, and shook the powder well up in the pan. A leaf of the rare bouquet peeped from under its covering. Madame de Parabére, flirting and ogling outrageously, as was her custom, whispered again in Captain George’s ear, with a little affected laugh. It seemed to the eager watcher that her lips shaped the hated syllables—“Mulatto.” It was time to take aim now, sure and deadly, preparatory to giving fire. A cluster of stephanotis showed out like ivory against the smooth black satin. Madame de Parabére clapped her hands, and exclaimed with a child’s glee, “But madame, what a bouquet! Madame is indeed fortunate! Such flowers are not to be procured within leagues of Paris. How exquisite! How ravishing! Madame is so good. Madame will permit me to have one little breath of their fragrance. Only one!” The Marquise hesitated. An instinct of womanly forbearance prompted mercy even to another woman. Vindictive as she felt, and with her finger on the trigger, she would yet spare her, she thought; but the insolent creature should know her enemy, and should be taught that even the Regent’s favourite could not command such bouquets as the acknowledged beauty of the Court. “They were sent me as a gift, madame,” she observed, haughtily, and withholding the flowers. “I value them because ours are not yet blown at the Hôtel Montmirail.” “Pardon, madame!” retorted the other, unable, now that she knew her, to forego this opening for a thrust. “Tropical, of course! From an admirer, madame? or perhaps a kinsman? Very dark, no doubt, and with close curled hair. I offer you my compliments from the bottom of my heart!”