“I have often thought of you,” he said, with a very tender chivalry, “and always as an inspiration.” She coloured painfully. “You are on the quest of glory, are you not?” she asked in a breath. “You have my secret,” he answered, half wistfully, half proudly. For the moment both his reserve and his strength gave way before the impulse to utterly confide in this strange, cold creature and take her comfort, her admonitions, maybe her praise; but he checked the desire, though she might have read it in his hazel eyes as he turned them softly, yet mysteriously, on her. She rose, and he hardened instantly into utter reserve. “I have no company to-night, or I would desire you to stay,” she said. “Some time you must come. I hope you will be very successful, Monsieur le Marquis.” The words were very formal, but as she spoke she held out her right hand. Luc took it as he formed his answer, and dropped his grave eyes from her face to her fingers. A curious little shock of surprise and dismay brought the colour to his cheeks. On the Countess’s forefinger was a diamond ring curiously set round with points formed of sapphires--the very jewel Luc had flung at the feet of the page in the Governor’s house at Avignon, or its exact counterpart. “Why are you silent?” she asked rather haughtily, and withdrew her hand. “The ring you wear reminded me of another I saw in the possession of some one so different from you, Countess, that the mere connexion gave me a start.” “Which ring?” She wore several. “The diamond, Madame, on your first finger.” “That is very extraordinary!” she exclaimed. “In what way, Madame?” She flushed now. “Oh, I did not know there were two such rings, that is all.” She seemed desirous of dismissing the subject, and he had no excuse for pressing it, though he wondered that she should not carelessly have told him how she came by the jewel, and so have set at rest his first impression--that she was wearing the actual jewel M. de Richelieu had offered him as a bribe. “I hope I shall see you at Versailles,” she said. She was walking towards the gate, and her stiff skirts rustled on the untidy gravel path. “I think you are on a sorrowful quest,” she added timidly; “forgive me.” “Believe me that I am happy,” he answered gravely. Above the dark bulk of the house was the primrose-coloured moon, a thin crescent; there was a shiver in the air. Luc looked at the Countess, and thought that her eyes were suddenly flushed with tears. “If I could help you, if I could prevent it,” she began passionately, then checked herself and held out, curiously enough, her left hand. “Good-bye,” she said. He kissed her fingers and left her. As he passed along the darkening street before her house he thought that he had never known the fading of the sky and the first glimmering of the moon of such poignant beauty. CHAPTER III A PAVILION AT VERSAILLES