“Le Pont is in a dream, surely, but I am glad. I was excited and didn’t realize what a scrape they would be in!” [Illustration: Le Pont] Years later Marie Josephine remembered the incident; in fact she never really forgot it. There were times when she could shut her eyes and see, in that uncanny way in which we do see long-ago things, the old coach, the faded coat of arms that had not been regilded that summer, the old blue lining, the warm August sun streaming in, bringing with it the odor of freshly cut hay and oats, thin rows of poplars rising against the startling blue of the sky, and the peasant women bending over their work in the field beyond. She could see Denise’s astonished gaze, from under her lace hood. She always remembered the words and the whole incident because it was the beginning of the great change. Madame le Pont was right. Things that had mattered so much were beginning to be not so important. There would be a time when they would not matter at all. CHAPTER VI AUGUST TENTH, 1792 Lisle and his mother had finished their déjeuner in the great dining room of the Paris house. The tall, gilded clock in the entrance hall had just struck twelve. All through the meal the cannons in the Carrousel, the inner court of the Tuileries palace, less than a mile away, had thundered outside. The glass chandelier above the table had shaken until its chains, jangling together, made a sound like music in the dim, vast room. The amber-colored velvet curtains at the windows were drawn closely together and the room was lighted by four candles in gold candlesticks on the table. Lisle piled his nutshells in a heap on his plate. He had something to tell his mother and he did not know how to go about it. There was a dish of fruit on the table, as well as a carved bowl full of nuts and a carafe of wine and one of water, and even a bowl of flowers, a few red roses which Henri had picked that morning from the vine by the coach house. The comtesse leaned forward and picked one from the white bowl and held it to her face. Then she said what she had been thinking all through the meal: “Nothing would matter if only you had gone with the others, Lisle. Why did I let you stay!” “Because you knew that I would not go!” Lisle answered. She looked at him and he returned her look steadily. “I’m not a child any longer. I’m fifteen and a half and the head of the house,” he went on. “I’ve stayed to see Paris now. I want to see what happens.” The comtesse put both hands over her eyes and sat that way for a moment. It was as though she would shut out all the confusion and worry of the past weeks and months, especially of the last two days.