"He is a very gentlemanly person, Count, as Mrs Selwyn justly observes, and, as you can perceive, a very handsome man. Further than that, he was Colonel of one of his Majesty's _crack_ regiments, as they call them, and is now on half-pay. He is, moreover, a man of high fashion, and of the first standing in society. And, last of all, which is the secret of the whole, he is the husband of a very charming little Frenchwoman, a particular friend of Caroline's and mine, one of the prettiest and nicest persons on earth, with whom he ran away some six months since, fancying her to be--" "Valerie!" exclaimed Caroline, blushing fiery red. "Caroline!" replied I, quietly. "What _were_ you going to say?" "Fancying her to be a very great heiress," I continued; "but finding her to be a far better thing, a delightful, beautiful, and excellent wife." "Happy man!" said de Chavannes, with a half sigh. "Why do you say so, Count?" "To have married one for whom you vouch so strongly. Is that any common fortune?" "It is rather common, Count, just of late I mean," said Caroline, laughing. "You do not know that among Valerie's other accomplishments she is the greatest little match-maker in existence. She marries off all her friends as fast--oh! you cannot think how fast." "I _hope_, I mean to say I _think_," he corrected himself, not without some little confusion, "that she is not quite so bad as you make her out. She has not yet made any match for herself, I believe. No, no. I don't believe she is quite so bad." "I would not be too sure, Count, were I you," she answered, desirous of paying me off a little for some of the badinage with which I had treated her. "These ladies, with so many strings to their bow--" It was now my time to exclaim "Caroline!" and I did so not without giving some little emphasis of severity to my tone, for I really thought she was going beyond the limits of propriety, if not of _persiflage_; and I will do her the justice to say that she felt it herself, for she blushed very much as I spoke, and was at once silent. The awkwardness of this pause was fortunately broken by the return of Auguste and Lionel at a sharp canter; for the review was now entirely at an end, and they had now for the first moment remembered that, having promised to return in a quarter of an hour, they had suffered two hours or more to elapse, and that we were probably all alone. Caroline immediately began to rally Lionel and Auguste; the former, with whom she was very intimate, pretty severely, for their want of gallantry in leaving us all alone and unprotected in such a crowd. "Not the least danger--not the least!" replied Lionel hastily. "Had we not known that, we should have returned long ago."