at my lodgings in town, looking a
disgusting object.... I could not appear before you until I had washed
some of the French mud from off my person. Then His Royal Highness
demanded my presence. He wanted news of the Duchesse de Verneuil, whom I
had the honour of escorting over from France. By the time I had told him
all that he wished to hear, there was no chance of finding you at home,
and I thought I should see you here."

Marguerite said nothing for a moment, but her foot impatiently tapped
the ground, and her fingers were fidgeting with the gold fringe of her
scarf. The look of joy, of exquisite happiness, seemed to have suddenly
vanished from her face; there was a deep furrow between her brows.

She sighed a short, sharp sigh, and cast a rapid upward glance at her
husband.

He was looking down at her, smiling good-naturedly, a trifle
sarcastically perhaps, and the frown on her face deepened.

"Percy," she said abruptly.

"Yes, m'dear."

"These anxieties are terrible to bear. You have been twice over to
France within the last month, dealing with your life as lightly as if
it did not now belong to me. When will you give up these mad adventures,
and leave others to fight their own battles and to save their own lives
as best they may?"

She had spoken with increased vehemence, although her voice was scarce
raised above a whisper. Even in her sudden, passionate anger she was on
her guard not to betray his secret. He did not reply immediately, but
seemed to be studying the beautiful face on which heartbroken anxiety
was now distinctly imprinted.

Then he turned and looked at the solitary booth in the distance, across
the frontal of which a large placard had been recently affixed, bearing
the words: "Come and see the true representation of the guillotine!"

In front of the booth a man dressed in ragged breeches, with Phrygian
cap on his head, adorned with a tri-colour cockade, was vigorously
beating a drum, shouting volubly the while:

"Come in and see, come in and see! the only realistic presentation of
the original guillotine. Hundreds perish in Paris every day! Come and
see! Come and see! the perfectly vivid performance of what goes on
hourly in Paris at the present moment."

Marguerite had followed the direction of Sir Percy's eyes. She too was
looking at the booth, she heard the man's monotonous, raucous cries. She
gave a slight shudder and once more looked imploringly at her husband.
His face--though