"Besides, the coxcomb is just now devoting himself, body and soul (such as they are!) to that insufferable little _intriguante_, Madame de Marignan. He is to be seen with her in every drawing-room and theatre throughout Paris. For my part, I am amazed that a woman of the world should suffer herself to be compromised to that extent--especially one so experienced in these _affaires du coeur_." Madame de Marignan! Compromised--experienced--_intriguante_! I felt as if I were choking. "To be sure, there is that poor English lad whom she drags about with her, to play propriety," continued she; "but do you suppose the world is blinded by so shallow an artifice?" "What English lad?" I asked, startled out of all sense of precaution, and desperately resolved to know the worst. "What English lad? Why, Hippolyte, you are more stupid than ever! I pointed him out to you the other night at the Comedie Française--a pale, handsome boy, of about nineteen or twenty, with brown curling hair, and very fine eyes, which were riveted on Madame de Marignan the whole evening. Poor fellow! I cannot help pitying him." "Then--then, you think she really does not love him?" I said. And this time my voice was hoarse enough, without any need of feigning. "Love him! Ridiculous! What does such a woman understand by love? Certainly neither the sentiment nor the poetry of it! Tush, Hippolyte! I do not wish to be censorious; but every one knows that ever since M. de Marignan has been away in Algiers, that woman has had, not one devoted admirer, but a dozen; and now that her husband is coming back...." "Coming back! ... her husband!" I echoed, half rising in my place, and falling back again, as if stunned. "Good heavens! is she not a widow?" It was now the lady's turn to be startled. "A widow!" she repeated. "Why, you know as well as I that--_Dieu_! To whom I am speaking?" "Madame," I said, as steadily as my agitation would let me, "I beg you not to be alarmed. I am not, it is true, the person whom you have supposed; but--Nay, I implore you...." She here uttered a quick cry, and darted forward for the check-string. Arresting her hand half way, respectfully but firmly, I went on:-- "How I came here, I will explain presently. I am a gentleman; and upon the word of a gentleman, Madame, am innocent of any desire to offend or alarm you. Can you--will you--hear me for one moment?" "I appear, sir, to have no alternative," replied she, trembling like a caged bird. "I might have left you undeceived, Madame. I might have extricated myself from, this painful position undiscovered--but for some words which just escaped your lips; some words so nearly concerning the--the honor and happiness of--of.... in short, I lost my presence of mind. I now implore you to tell me if all that you have just been saying of Madame de Marignan is strictly true."