e holiday of Montpipeau. The transparency of their indifference
in company, their meeting eyes, their trysts with the secrecy of an
ostrich, were the subjects of constant amusement to the elders, more
especially as the shyness, blushes, and caution were much more on the
side of the young husband than on that of the lady. Fresh from her
convent, simple with childishness and innocence, it was to her only
the natural completion of her life to be altogether Berenger's, and
the brief concealment of their full union added a certain romantic
enchantment, which added to her exultation in her victory over her cruel
kindred. She had been upon her own mind, poor child, for her few weeks
of court life. She had been upon her own mind, poor child, for her few
weeks of court life, but not long enough to make her grow older, though
just so long as to make the sense of her having her own protector with
her doubly precious. He, on the other hand, though full of happiness,
did also feel constantly deepening on him the sense of the charge
and responsibility he had assumed, hardly knowing how. The more dear
Eustacie became to him, the more she rested on him and became entirely
his, the more his boyhood and INSOUCIANCE drifted away behind him; and
while he could hardly bear to heave his darling a moment out of his
sight, the less he could endure any remark or jest upon his affection
for her. His home had been a refined one, where Cecile's convent purity
seemed to diffuse an atmosphere of modest reserve such as did not
prevail in the court of the Maiden Queen herself, and the lad of
eighteen had not seem enough of the outer world to have rubbed off any
of that grace. His seniority to his little wife seemed to show itself
chiefly in his being put out of countenance for her, when she was too
innocent and too proud of her secret matronhood to understand or resent
the wit.

Little did he know that this was the ballet-like interlude in a great
and terrible tragedy, whose first act was being played out on the stage
where they schemed and sported, like their own little drama, which was
all the world to them, and noting to the others. Berenger knew indeed
that the Admiral was greatly rejoiced that the Nid de Merle estates
should go into Protestant hands, and that the old gentleman lost no
opportunity of impressing on him that they were a heavy trust, to be
used for the benefit of 'the Religion,' and for the support of the King
in his better mind. But