y considering it as a distant event of
shadowy reality. His thoughts, always disposed to take the opposite
side, did not share in the general alarm. The insolence of the
Counsellor now appeared to him but the boastings of a burgher turned
into a soldier. The disquietude of the people of Paris, was but the
nervous agitation of a city which lived placidly and became alarmed at
the first hint of danger to its comfort. So many times they had spoken
of an immediate war, always settling things peacefully at the last
moment! . . . Furthermore he did not want war to come because it would
upset all his plans for the future; and the man accepted as logical
and reasonable everything that suited his selfishness, placing it above
reality.

"No, there will not be war," he repeated as he continued pacing up and
down the garden. "These people are beside themselves. How could a war
possibly break out in these days?" . . .

And after disposing of his doubts, which certainly would in a short
time come up again, he thought of the joy of the moment, consulting his
watch. Five o'clock! She might come now at any minute! He thought that
he recognized her afar off in a lady who was passing through the grating
by the rue Pasquier. She seemed to him a little different, but it
occurred to him that possibly the Summer fashions might have altered
her appearance. But soon he saw that he had made a mistake. She was not
alone, another lady was with her. They were perhaps English or North
American women who worshipped the memory of Marie Antoinette and wished
to visit the Chapelle Expiatoire, the old tomb of the executed queen.
Julio watched them as they climbed the flights of steps and crossed the
interior patio in which were interred the eight hundred Swiss soldiers
killed in the attack of the Tenth of August, with other victims of
revolutionary fury.

Disgusted at his error, he continued his tramp. His ill humor made the
monument with which the Bourbon restoration had adorned the old cemetery
of the Madeleine, appear uglier than ever to him. Time was passing, but
she did not come. Every time that he turned, he looked hungrily at the
entrances of the garden. And then it happened as in all their meetings.
She suddenly appeared as if she had fallen from the sky or risen up from
the ground, like an apparition. A cough, a slight rustling of footsteps,
and as he turned, Julio almost collided with her.

"Marguerite! Oh, Marguerite!" . . .

It was she,