t panel, which, sliding back into the wall,
opened a passage between the two rooms, and showed La Mole in the
doorway, like one of Titian's fine portraits in its gilded frame.

"La Mole!" exclaimed Coconnas, without paying any attention to
Marguerite or taking the time to thank her for the surprise she had
arranged for him; "La Mole, my friend, my dear La Mole!" and he rushed
into the arms of his friend, upsetting the armchair in which he had been
sitting and the table that stood in his way.

La Mole returned his embrace with effusion; then, turning to the
Duchesse de Nevers:

"Pardon me, madame, if the mention of my name has sometimes disturbed
your happiness." "Certainly," he added, glancing at Marguerite with a
look of ineffable tenderness, "it has not been my fault that I have not
seen you sooner."

"You see, Henriette," said Marguerite, "I have kept my word; here he
is!"

"Is it, then, to the prayers of Madame la Duchesse that I owe this
happiness?" asked La Mole.

"To her prayers alone," replied Marguerite.

Then, turning to La Mole, she continued:

"La Mole, I will allow you not to believe one word of what I say."

Meanwhile Coconnas pressed his friend to his heart over and over again,
walked round him a dozen times, and even held a candelabrum to his face
the better to see him; then suddenly turning, he knelt down before
Marguerite and kissed the hem of her robe.

"Ah! that is pleasant!" said the Duchesse de Nevers. "I suppose now you
will find me bearable."

"By Heaven!" cried Coconnas, "I shall find you as adorable as ever; only
now I can tell you so with a lighter heart, and were there any number of
Poles, Sarmatians, and other hyperborean barbarians present I should
make them all admit that you were the queen of beauties."

"Gently, gently, Coconnas," said La Mole, "Madame Marguerite is here!"

"Oh! I cannot help that," cried Coconnas, with the half-comic air which
belonged to him alone, "I still assert that Madame Henriette is the
queen of beauties and Madame Marguerite is the beauty of queens."

But whatever he might say or do, the Piedmontese, completely carried
away by the joy of having found his dear La Mole, had neither eyes nor
ears for any one but him.

"Come, my beautiful queen," said Madame de Nevers, "come, let us leave
these dear friends to chat awhile alone. They have a thousand things to
say to each other which would be interrupted by our conversation. It is
hard for us, but