very if I was your slave."

"There, there, Louise;" and she laid her hand gently on the head of
the girl who had sunk on the floor beside her. "We are all slaves,
more or less, to something in this world. Our hearts arrange that
without appeal to the law-makers."

"All but yours," said the maid, looking up at her fondly and half
questioningly, "I don't believe your heart is allowed to arrange
anything for you. Your head does it all; that is why I say you are
hard as iron in some things. I don't honestly believe your heart is
even in this cause you take such risks for. You think it over, decide
it is wrong, and deliberately outstrip every one else in your endeavor
to right it. That is all because you are very learned and very
superior to the emotions of most people;" and she touched the hand of
the Marquise caressingly. "That is how I have thought it all out; for
I see that the motives others are moved by never touch you; the
others--even the high officials--do not understand you, or only one
did."

Her listener had drifted from attention to the soft caressing tones of
the one time Parisian figurante, whose devotion was so apparent and
whose nature required a certain amount of demonstration. The Marquise
had, from the first, comprehended her wonderfully well, and knew that
back of those feminine, almost childish cravings for expression, there
lived an affectionate nature too long debarred from worthy objects,
and now absolutely adoring the one she deemed her benefactress; all
the more adoring because of the courage and daring, that to her had a
fascinating touch of masculinity about it; no woman less masterful,
nor less beautiful, could have held the pretty Kora so completely. The
dramatic side of her nature was appealed to by the luxurious
surroundings of the Marquise, and the delightful uncertainty, as each
day's curtain of dawn was lifted, whether she was to see comedy or
tragedy enacted before the night fell. She had been audience to both,
many times, since the Marquise had been her mistress.

Just now the mistress was in some perplexed quandary of her own, and
gave little heed to the flattering opinions of the maid, and only
aroused to the last remark at which she turned with questioning eyes,
not entirely approving:

"Whom do you mean?" she asked, with a trifle of constraint, and the
maid sighed as she selected a ribbon to bind the braid she had
finished.

"No one you would remember, Marquise," she said, sh