d to her seducer, who thought she would be
his all the more surely if he could only show her off. Side by side they
walked two or three times amid the groups who crowded the rooms. The
Comtesse de Soulanges, evidently uneasy, paused for an instant at each
door before entering, only doing so after stretching her neck to look at
all the men there. This alarm, which crowned the Baron's satisfaction,
did not seem to be removed till he said to her, "Make yourself easy;
_he_ is not here."

They thus made their way to an immense picture gallery in a wing of the
mansion, where their eyes could feast in anticipation on the splendid
display of a collation prepared for three hundred persons. As supper was
about to begin, Martial led the Countess to an oval boudoir looking on
to the garden, where the rarest flowers and a few shrubs made a scented
bower under bright blue hangings. The murmurs of the festivity here
died away. The Countess, at first startled, refused firmly to follow the
young man; but, glancing in a mirror, she no doubt assured herself that
they could be seen, for she seated herself on an ottoman with a fairly
good grace.

"This room is charming," said she, admiring the sky-blue hangings looped
with pearls.

"All here is love and delight!" said the Baron, with deep emotion.

In the mysterious light which prevailed he looked at the Countess,
and detected on her gently agitated face an expression of uneasiness,
modesty, and eagerness which enchanted him. The young lady smiled, and
this smile seemed to put an end to the struggle of feeling surging in
her heart; in the most insinuating way she took her adorer's left hand,
and drew from his finger the ring on which she had fixed her eyes.

"What a fine diamond!" she exclaimed in the artless tone of a young girl
betraying the incitement of a first temptation.

Martial, troubled by the Countess' involuntary but intoxicating touch,
like a caress, as she drew off the ring, looked at her with eyes as
glittering as the gem.

"Wear it," he said, "in memory of this hour, and for the love of----"

She was looking at him with such rapture that he did not end the
sentence; he kissed her hand.

"You give it me?" she said, looking much astonished.

"I wish I had the whole world to offer you!"

"You are not joking?" she went on, in a voice husky with too great
satisfaction.

"Will you accept only my diamond?"

"You will never take it back?" she insisted.

"Never."