and you." His eyes
alone expressed the final words, but they spoke so eloquently that the
woman of the world smiled; attempted to blush, and dropping her own
eyes, failed to see the amusement in his.

"Your gallantry argues no lack of practice, Monsieur Loris," she
returned; glancing at him over her fan. "Who was she, during those
months of absence? Come; confess; was she some worldly soul like the
Kora of your latest picture, or was it the religieuse--the new
marquise about whom every one is curious?"

"The Marquise? What particular Marquise?"

"One more particular than you were wont to cultivate our first season
in Rome," remarked Lavergne.

"Oh! oh! Monsieur Dumaresque!" and the fan became a shield from which
Madame peered at him. Sidonie almost smiled, but recovered herself,
and gave attention to the primroses.

"You see!--Madame Choudey is shocked that you have turned to
saintliness."

"Madame knows me too well to suppose I have ever turned away from
it," retorted Dumaresque. "Do not credit the gossip of Lavergne. He
has worked so long among clays and marbles that he has grown a
cold-blooded cynic. He distrusts all warmth and color in life."

"Then why not introduce him to the Marquise? He might find his ideal
there--the atmosphere of the sanctuary! I mean the new Marquise de
Caron."

"Oh!" Dumaresque looked from one to the other blankly and then
laughed. "It is Madame Alain--the Marquise de Caron you call the
devotee? My faith--that is droll!"

"What, then, is so droll?"

"Why should you laugh, Monsieur Loris? What else were we to think of a
bride who chooses a convent in preference to society?"

"It was decided she must be very ugly or very devout to make that
choice."

"A natural conclusion from your point of view," agreed Dumaresque.
"Will you be shocked when I tell you she is no less a radical than
Alain himself?--that her favorite prophet is Voltaire, and that her
books of devotion are not known in the church?"

"Horror!--an infidel!--and only a girl of twenty!" gasped the demure
Sidonie.

"Chut!--she may be a veteran of double that. Alain always had a fancy
for the grenadiers--the originals. But of course," he added moodily,
"we must go."

"Take cheer," laughed Dumaresque, "for I shall be there; and I promise
you safe conduct through the gates when the grenadier feminine grows
too oppressive."

"Do you observe," queried Madame, slyly, "that while Monsieur Loris
does speak of her relig