cheeks became pallid.

"But I have taken with me something better than that portrait: I
preserved you, you were always present, and pretty, so pretty--as you
are now, Marianne--Look at yourself! No one could be lovelier!"

"And why," she said slowly, speaking in a deep, endearing tone, "why did
you not speak to me thus, of old?"

"Ah! of old!" said the duke angrily.

She allowed her head to fall on the back of the divan; looking at this
man as she well knew how, and insensibly creeping closer to him, she
breathed in his ears these burning words:

"Formerly, one who was your friend was beside me, is that not so?"

"Do not speak to me of him," Jose said abruptly.

"On the contrary, I am determined to tell you that even if I had loved
him, I should not have hesitated for a moment to leave him and follow
you. But I did not love him."

"Marianne!"

"You won't believe me? I never loved him. I have never been his
mistress."

"I do not ask your secret. I do not speak of him," said the duke, who
had now become deadly pale.

"And I am determined to speak to you of him. Never, you understand,
never was Guy de Lissac my lover. No, in spite of appearances; he has
never even kissed my lips. I thought I loved him, but before yielding, I
had time to discover that I did not love him! And I waited, I swear to
you, expecting that you would say to me: 'I love you!'"

"I?"

"You," said Marianne, in a feeble tone. "You never guessed then?"

And she crept with an exquisitely undulating movement still closer to
Rosas, who, as if drawn by some magnetic fluid, surrendered his face to
this woman with the wandering eyes, half-open lips, from which a gentle
sigh escaped and died away in the duke's hair.

He said nothing, but hastily seizing Marianne's hand, he drew her face
close to his lips, her pink nostrils dilated as if the better to breathe
the incense of love; and wild, distracted, intoxicated, he pressed his
feverish, burning lips upon that fresh mouth that he felt exhaled the
perfume of a flower that opens to the morning dew.

"I love you now, I loved you then!--" Marianne said to him, after that
kiss that paled his cheeks.

Rosas had risen: a thunder of applause greeted the termination of a song
in the other salon and the throng was pouring into the smaller salon.
Marianne saw Uncle Kayser, who was arguing with Ramel, whose kindly,
lean face wore an expression of weariness. She also rose, grasped the
duke's hands wit