Louison Brisot was one of these women; born in the middle classes, gifted by nature with strong animal beauty, thirsting for knowledge, full of that keen vitality which demands action, and must have excitement, she had followed Mirabeau into the very heart of the revolution. Haughty and imperious to others, she had always been subservient to him. In her idolatry of the man, and her vanity as a woman, she believed herself to be his sole confidant, and the supreme object of his love. She knew that the queen had, over and over again, refused even to see this man, who was to her a demi-god, and hated her for thus scorning him. In her heart she rejoiced, perhaps unconsciously, that royal pride kept the man she loved away from a court, where so many had been won over to the king, by the beauty and eloquence of his wife. The two great passions of Louison Brisot’s life were thrown into a wild tumult by the scene she had just witnessed; still she found power to control herself. Plunging into the thicket where her horse was tied, she attempted to unknot his bridle from the sapling; but her hands shook with passion, and were so long in doing it, that she fairly stamped down the earth with impatience before she could mount to the saddle, and ride away toward Paris. The young woman was but just in time. She heard the tread of Mirabeau’s horse following close upon her as she dashed by the palace, and on toward Paris with increasing speed. She must reach home before him. It was possible that the count would call upon her that night, for he was a man who paid no respect to time, and cared nothing for the received usages of society. At her house much of his leisure time had been formerly spent, and she believed herself the depository of all his secrets. But he had been deceiving her. This thought wounded the woman through her hard heart, and leveled her evil pride to the dust. She had hated the queen before, now that hatred settled into bitter detestation. These two persons traveled home so near together, that the beat of hoofs sent back by her horse more than once struck the ear of Mirabeau, as he approached the rising ground which she was passing. Of this he took no heed. Though a demagogue and a profligate, this man had pledged his support in good faith to the queen, and his quick brain was even then forming plans, by which he hoped to unite her cause with that of France, and harmonize all contending elements into a constitutional monarchy. There was enough in all this to tax even his great brain to the utmost, and he had no time to observe the fall of those hoofs in the distance, which, perhaps, carried his destiny with them. CHAPTER LXXIII. FATHER AND DAUGHTER.