"It concerns your whole future, Crystal," he replied with ever-growing solemnity and conviction. "You must have known all along that I have never ceased to love you: you have always been the only possible woman for me--my ideal, in fact. Your father's injustice I am willing to forget. Your troth was plighted to me and I have done nothing to deserve all the insults which he thought fit to heap upon me. I wanted you to know, Crystal, that my love is still yours, and that the fortune and glory which I now go forth to win I will place with inexpressible joy at your feet." She shrugged her shoulders and an air of supreme indifference spread over her face. "Is that all?" she asked coldly. "All? What do you mean? I don't understand." "I mean that you persuaded me to listen to you on the pretence that you had news to tell me of the doings at Waterloo--news on which my happiness depended. You have not told me a single fact that concerns me in the least." "It concerns you as it concerns me, Crystal. Your happiness is bound up with mine. You are still my promised wife. I go to win glory for my name which will soon be yours. You and I, Crystal, hand in hand! think of it! our love has survived the political turmoils--united in love, united in glory, you and I will be the most brilliant stars that will shine at the Imperial Court of France." She did not try to interrupt his tirade, but looked on him with cool wonderment, as one gazes on some curious animal that is raving and raging behind iron bars. When he had finished she said quietly: "You are mad, I think, M. de Marmont. At any rate, you had better go now: time is getting on, and you will lose your place in the diligence." He was less to her than the dust under her feet, and his protestations had not even the power to rouse her wrath. Indeed, all that worried her at this moment was vexation with herself for having troubled to listen to him at all: it had been worse than foolish to suppose that he had any news to impart which did not directly concern himself. So now, while he, utterly taken aback, was staring at her open-mouthed and bewildered, she turned away, cold and full of disdain, gathering her draperies round her, and started to walk slowly toward the stairs. Her clinging white skirt made a soft, swishing sound as it brushed the tiled floor, and she herself--with her slender figure, graceful neck and crown of golden curls, looked, as the gloom of evening wrapped her in, more like an intangible elf--an apparition--gliding through space, than just a scornful woman who had thought fit to reject the importunate addresses of an unwelcome suitor.