“Mon Dieu!” she exclaimed, angrily interrupting him. “See what you are for all your high-sounding vaunts of yourself and your attributes! A woman may not smile upon you, may not say one kind word to you, but you must imagine you have made a conquest. Ma foi, you and yours do not deserve to be treated as anything but vassals. When we show you a kindness, see how you abuse it. We extend to you our little finger and you instantly lay claim to the whole arm. Because last night I permitted myself to exchange a jest with you, because I chance to be kind to you again to-day, you repay me with insults!” “Stop!” he cried, rousing himself once more. “That is too much to say, Mademoiselle. To tell a woman that you love her is never to insult her. To be loved is never to be slighted. Upon the meanest of His creatures it is enjoined to love the same God whom the King loves, and there is no insult to God in professing love for Him. Would you make a woman more than that?” “Monsieur, you put questions I have no mind to answer; you suggest a discussion I have no inclination to pursue. For you and me let it suffice that I account myself affronted by your words, your tone, and your manner. You drive me to say these things; by your insistence you compel me to be harsh. We will end this matter here and now, Monsieur, and I will ask you to understand that I never wish it reopened, else shall I be forced to seek protection at the hands of my father or my brother.” “You may seek it now, Suzanne,” quoth a voice from the thicket at her back, a voice which came to startle both of them though in different ways. Before they had recovered from their surprise the Marquis de Bellecour stood before them. He was a tall man of some fifty years of age, but so powerful of frame and so scrupulous in dress that he might have conveyed an impression of more youth. His face, though handsome in a high-bred way, was puffed and of an unhealthy yellow. But the eyes were as keen as the mouth was voluptuous, and in his carefully dressed black hair there were few strands of grey. He came slowly forward, and his lowering glance wandered from his daughter to his secretary in inquiry. At last-- “Well?” he demanded. “What is the matter?” “It is nothing, Monsieur,” his daughter answered him. “A trifling affair 'twixt M. la Boulaye and me, with which I will not trouble you.” “It is not nothing, my lord,” cried La Boulaye, his voice vibrating oddly. “It is that I love your daughter and that I have told her of it.” He was in a very daring mood that morning. The Marquis glanced at him in dull amazement. Then a flush crept into his sallow cheeks and mounted to his brow. An inarticulate grunt came from his thick lips. “Canaille!” he exclaimed, through set teeth. “Can you have presumed so far?”