e bet, and
now insisted on wearing the glove. 'He is the privileged young madman
our women make of a handsome youth,' said Madame d'Auffray.

Where am I? thought Beauchamp--in what land, he would have phrased it,
of whirlwinds catching the wits, and whipping the passions? Calmer than
they, but unable to command them, and guessing that Renee's errand of
the morning, by which he had lost hours of her, pertained to the glove,
he said quiveringly, 'Madame la Marquise objects?'

'We,' replied Madame d'Auffray, 'contend that the glove was not loyally
won. The wager was upon your coming to the invitation, not upon your
conquering the elements. As to his flaunting the glove for a favour, I
would ask you, whom does he advertize by that? Gloves do not wear white;
which fact compromises none but the wearer. He picked it up from the
ground, and does not restore it; that is all. You see a boy who catches
at anything to placard himself. There is a compatriot of yours, a
M. Ducie, who assured us you must be with an uncle in your county of
Sussex. Of course we ran the risk of the letter missing you, but the
chance was worth a glove. Can you believe it, M. Beauchamp? it was I,
old woman as I am, I who provoked the silly wager. I have long desired
to meet you; and we have little society here, we are desperate with
loneliness, half mad with our whims. I said, that if you were what I
had heard of you, you would come to us at a word. They dared Madame la
Marquise to say the same. I wished to see the friend of Frenchmen, as M.
Roland calls you; not merely to see him--to know him, whether he is
this perfect friend whose absolute devotion has impressed my dear
sister Renee's mind. She respects you: that is a sentiment scarcely
complimentary to the ideas of young men. She places you above human
creatures: possibly you may not dislike to be worshipped. It is not to
be rejected when one's influence is powerful for good. But you leave us
to-morrow!'

'I' might stay...' Beauchamp hesitated to name the number of hours. He
stood divided between a sense of the bubbling shallowness of the life
about him, and a thought, grave as an eye dwelling on blood, of sinister
things below it.

'I may stay another day or two,' he said, 'if I can be of any earthly
service.'

Madame d'Auffray bowed as to a friendly decision on his part, saying,
'It would be a thousand pities to disappoint M. Roland; and it will be
offering my brother an amicable chance. I will