e of lace, fell white and
pure on the heavy folds of her crimson velvet robe.

"She is just the thing for you," said Claude Vignon, smiling
sardonically at Calyste.

The young man was deeply wounded by the words, and by the manner in
which they were said.

"Don't put such ideas into Calyste's mind; you don't know how dangerous
such jokes may prove to be," said Mademoiselle des Touches, hastily.
"I know Beatrix, and there is something too grandiose in her nature to
allow her to change. Besides, Conti will be here."

"Ha!" said Claude Vignon, satirically, "a slight touch of jealousy, eh?"

"Can you really think so?" said Camille, haughtily.

"You are more perspicacious than a mother," replied Claude Vignon, still
sarcastically.

"But it would be impossible," said Camille, looking at Calyste.

"They are very well matched," remarked Vignon. "She is ten years older
than he; and it is he who appears to be the girl--"

"A girl, monsieur," said Calyste, waking from his reverie, "who has been
twice under fire in La Vendee! If the Cause had had twenty thousand more
such girls--"

"I was giving you some well-deserved praise, and that is easier than to
give you a beard," remarked Vignon.

"I have a sword for those who wear their beards too long," cried
Calyste.

"And I am very good at an epigram," said the other, smiling. "We are
Frenchmen; the affair can easily be arranged."

Mademoiselle des Touches cast a supplicating look on Calyste, which
calmed him instantly.

"Why," said Felicite, as if to break up the discussion, "do young men
like my Calyste, begin by loving women of a certain age?"

"I don't know any sentiment more artless or more generous," replied
Vignon. "It is the natural consequence of the adorable qualities of
youth. Besides, how would old women end if it were not for such love?
You are young and beautiful, and will be for twenty years to come, so
I can speak of this matter before you," he added, with a keen look at
Mademoiselle des Touches. "In the first place the semi-dowagers, to whom
young men pay their first court, know much better how to make love than
younger women. An adolescent youth is too like a young woman himself
for a young woman to please him. Such a passion trenches on the fable of
Narcissus. Besides that feeling of repugnance, there is, as I think, a
mutual sense of inexperience which separates them. The reason why the
hearts of young women are only understood by mature men, who c