Certainly, none of her declared suitors had hitherto inspired it. Least of all, he to whom the world had lately given her as his affianced wife. Brave he was, no doubt, chivalrous in thought and action; stupid enough besides; yes, quite stupid enough for a husband! generous too, and considerate—but oh! not like the kind, unselfish, indulgent old heart she mourned for in widow’s weeds all those years ago. She could almost have cried again now, and yet she laughed when she thought of the united ages of her late husband and her present adorer. Was it her destiny, then, thus ever to captivate the affections of old men? and were their wrongs to be avenged at last by her own infatuation for a lover many years younger than herself? Again the burning blushes rose to her brow, and though Pierrot was the only witness present, she buried her face in her hands. Lifting her eyes once more, they rested on a picture that held the place of honour in her boudoir. It was a coloured drawing of considerable spirit, and had been given her by no less a favourite than the Prince-Marshal himself, for whose glorification it had been executed by a rising artist. It represented a battle-field, of which the Prince de Chateau-Guerrand constituted the principal object; and that officer was portrayed with considerable fidelity, advancing to the succour of the Count de Guiches, who at the head of the Guards was covering Villeroy’s retreat before Marlborough at Ramillies. Two or three broad, honest faces of the English grenadiers came well out from the smoke and confusion in the background, ingeniously increased by a fall of rafters and conflagration of an imaginary farm-house; but the Count de Guiches himself occupied no prominent place in the composition, dancing about on a little grey horse in one corner, as if studious not to interfere with the dominant figure, who was, indeed, the artist’s patron, and who presided over the whole in a full-bottomed wig, with a conceited smile on his face and a laced hat in his hand. There lay, also, a dead Musketeer in the foreground, admirably contrived to impart reality to the scene of conflict; and it was on this figure that the eyes of the Marquise fixed themselves, devouring it with a passionate gaze, in which admiration, longing, self-scorn, and self-reproach, seemed all combined. For a full minute the wild, pitiful expression never left her face, and during that minute she tore her handkerchief to the coronet near its hem. Then she rose and paced the room for a couple of turns, restless as a leopard; but ere she had made a third, footsteps were heard approaching through the bed-chamber. The door opened, and one of her servants announced “Monsieur l’Abbé Malletort!” CHAPTER XI WHAT THE SERPENT SAID