perhaps, have borne in
silence this more modest bastion of the flesh and the devil.

But the face beneath was a greater danger to those who hold that beauty
is a menace to salvation; on her cheek hung the rosy banner of youth;
in her eyes shone the bright arrows of conquest. And the duke,
discarding his backwardness, as a soldier his cloak before battle,
watched the hue that mantled her face, proffered his open breast to the
shining lances of her gaze, and capitulated unconditionally before the
smile of victory on her blood-red lips. With his great shoulders, his
massive neck and broad, virile face, he seemed a Cyclops among pygmies
in that gathering of slender courtiers and she but a flower by his side.

"I thought, Sire, your duke was timorous, bashful as a boy?" murmured
the Countess d'Etampes to the king.

"He was--on the road!" answered the king thoughtfully.

"Then has he marvelously recovered his assurance."

"In love, Madam, as in battle, the zest grows with the fray," said
Francis with meaning.

"And the duke is reputed a brave soldier. He looks very strong, as
if--almost--he might succeed with any woman he were minded to carry
off."

"To carry off!" laughed the monarch. "'Tis he, Madam, who will be
bound in tethers! At heart he's shame-faced as a callow younker."

She wilfully shook her head. "No woman could keep him in
leading-strings, your Majesty. There is something domineering, savage,
crushing, in his hand. Look at it, on the table there. Is it not
mighty as an iron gauntlet? What other man at the board has such a
brutal hand? The strength in it makes me shudder. Will she not bend
to it; kiss it?"

With amused superiority Francis regarded his fair neighbor on the left.
"Women, Madam, are but hasty judges of men," he said, dryly, "and then
'tis fancy more than reason which governs their verdict. If the duke
should seem over-confident, 'tis to hide a certain modesty, and not to
appear out of confidence in so large a company."

"And yet, Sire, at their first meeting he did not comport himself like
one easily put out," persisted the favorite. "''Tis with a cold hand
you welcome me, Princess,' he said, noticing her insensibility of
manner. Then rising he gazed upon her long and deep, as a soldier
might survey a battlefield. 'And yet,' said he, still holding her
fingers, 'I'll warrant me warm blood could course through this little
hand.' At that the color rose in her cheek; behold!