Of noble birth, entrancingly lovely, and an heiress. Heavens! what a combination; and at a time, too, as the queen had remarked, when everyone was out at elbows. It was evident that such a phenomenon must be snapped up at once; and straightway--helter-skelter up the wide stairs of the Hotel de Breze rushed a mob of needy suitors--a hungry pack, yelling in full cry, whose ravenous ardour so scared madame that she forgot to improve the occasion. They had never loved till now, they cried in unison. Their quarterings were legion, their rent-rolls were miles long. The tenants never paid, and the ermine was somewhat mud-stained, but these were trifling details. They all adored the divine Gabrielle for herself--her angel form alone; that she should happen to be an heiress was another detail, and of course rather a drawback than otherwise. The marechal laughed till his round red face was blue, for these disinterested persons oozed with ravening greed. The queen looked grave. To save her favourite from the maw of vultures was a responsibility she would not shirk. A spouse must be found for Gabrielle who might be trusted not to be outrageously bad to her. In these days a good husband of fitting rank was an extinct animal. Warily scanning the horizon, Marie Antoinette fixed, as the fitting swain, on Clovis, Marquis de Gange, and de Breze agreed with her majesty that Clovis was just the man. So far as family went, the De Ganges could compete with the noblest. Acres had dwindled; tenants were recalcitrant; Clovis's income was little more than nominal, but nowadays poverty was modish in the highest circles; and, besides, it is well that the husband of a great heiress should be kept under due control. The cunning old soldier had settled long ago that the spouse of his daughter should not make ducks and drakes of her broad pieces, at least without her full consent. He had arranged in his own mind that he would bind up the money tight, and place it in her hands, hedged about with safeguards when called to another world. Till then he would himself dispense his fortune as his darling should wish and dictate. To this arrangement de Gange was quite agreeable, knowing that the marechal was no skin-flint who would need abject suing. The old gentleman, who flattered himself that he was a judge of character, scanned the young man's features with keen scrutiny, and on the smooth surface could detect nothing of the ravenous wolf. The marquis was a tall, well-built, handsome fellow, dreamy and absent in manner, pedantic in his ways, a trifle too much enamoured of the crotchets of his day.