The noise of talk and laughter still filled the old château from end to end. Though the special guest of the evening had departed and royalty no longer graced the proceedings, since His Majesty had driven away to Versailles after having bidden adieu to the Chevalier de Saint George, M. le Duc d'Aumont's less important visitors showed no signs as yet of wishing to break up this convivial night.

The sound of dance music filled the air, and from the

salle d'armes

the merry strains of the gavotte, the tripping of innumerable feet, the incessant buzz of young voices, reached the more distant corridor like an echo from fairyland.

Lydie had remained quite a little while leaning against the cool marble wall, watching with eager intentness the group of gallant English and Scotch gentlemen congregated round their young Prince. Louis the Well-beloved, with that graciousness peculiar to all the Bourbons, had, severally and individually bidden "good-bye" to all. Each in turn had kissed the podgy white hand of the King of France, who had been so benignant a host to them all. None understood better than Louis XV, the art of leaving a pleasing impression on the mind of a departing friend. He had a smile, a jest, a word of encouragement for each whilst Jeanne de Pompadour, with one dainty hand on the King's shoulder, the other flirting her fan, emphasized each token of royal goodwill and of royal favour.

"Ah! milor Dunkeld, a pleasing journey to you. M. le Marquis de Perth, I pray you do not, amidst the fogs of England, forget the sunshine of France. Sir André Seafield, your absence will bring many tears to a pair of blue eyes I wot of."

She pronounced the foreign names with dainty affectation, and Louis had much ado to keep his eyes away from that bright, smiling face, and those ever-recurring dimples. Lydie felt a strange nausea at sight of these noble, high-born gentlemen paying such reverential homage to the low-born adventuress, and a deep frown appeared between her eyes when she saw Charles Edward Stuart bending as low before Jeanne Poisson as he had done just now before her – Lydie, daughter of the Duc d'Aumont.

Bah! what did it matter, after all? This world of irresponsible butterflies, of petty machinations and self-seeking intrigues: would she not quit it to-morrow for a land of poetry and romance, where women wield no sceptre save that of beauty, and where but one ruler is acknowledged and his name is Love?

She made a strenuous attempt to detach herself mentally from her surroundings; with a great effort of her will she succeeded in losing sight of the individuality of all these people round her. Lady Eglinton still talking at random beside her, Mme. de Pompadour yielding her hand to the kiss of a Stuart Prince, that fat and pompous man, whom duty bade her call "Your Majesty," all became mere puppets – dolls that laughed and chatted and danced, hanging on invisible strings, which the mighty hand of some grim giant was dangling for the amusement of his kind.

How paltry it seemed all at once! What did it matter if France was ruled by that vapid King or by that brainless, overdressed woman beside him? What did it matter if that young man with the shifty blue eyes and the fair, curly hair succeeded in ousting another man from the English throne?

What did matter was that Gaston was not faithless, that he loved her, and that she had felt the sweetness of a first kiss!

Happily back in dreamland now, she could once more afford to play her part amongst the marionettes. She was willing to yield the string which made her dance and talk and move into the hands of the fiercely humorous giant up aloft. No doubt it was he who pulled her along the corridor, made her join the group that congregated round departing royalty.

M. le Duc d'Aumont – the perfect courtier and gentleman – was already formulating his adieux. His Majesty the King of France would, by the rigid rule of etiquette, be the first to leave. Accompanied by Mme. de Pompadour and followed by M. le Duc, he was commencing his progress down the monumental staircase which led to the great entrance hall below.

Lydie, still made to move no doubt by that invisible giant hand, found it quite simple and easy to mingle with the crowd, to take the King's arm, being his hostess, whilst M. le Duc her father and Mme. de Pompadour followed close behind.

With her spirit wandering in dreamland, she was naturally somewhat distraite – not too much so, only sufficiently to cause Louis XV to make comparisons betwixt his sprightly Jeanne and this animated statue, whose cold little hand rested so impassively on the satin of his coat.

At the foot of the perron the King's Flemish horses, as round of body and heavy of gait as himself, were impatiently pawing the ground. The opening of the great gates sent a wave of sweet-scented air into the overheated château. Lydie was glad that her duty demanded that she should accompany the King down the steps to the door of his coach. The cool night breeze fanned her cheeks most pleasingly, the scent of June roses and of clove carnations filled the air, and from below the terraced gardens there came the softly-murmuring ripple of the Seine, winding her graceful curves toward the mighty city of Paris beyond.

Far away to the east, beyond the grim outline of cedar and poplar trees, a fair crescent moon appeared, chaste and cold.

"An emblem of our fair hostess to-night," said Louis with clumsy gallantry and pointing up to the sky, as Lydie bent her tall figure and kissed the royal hand.

Then she stood aside, having made a cold bow to Mme. de Pompadour; the fair Marquise was accompanying His Majesty to Versailles; she stepped into the coach beside him, surrounded by murmurs of flattery and adulation. Even Charles Edward made her a final speech of somewhat forced gallantry; he was the last to kiss her hand, and Lydie could almost hear the softly whispered words of entreaty with which he bade her not to forget.

And Jeanne Poisson – daughter of a kitchen wench – was condescendingly gracious to a Stuart Prince; then she calmly waved him aside, whilst the King apparently was content to wait, and called Lady Eglinton to the door of the coach.

"You are wasting too much time," she whispered quickly; "an you don't hurry now, you will be too late."

At last the departure was effected; the crowd, with backbone bent and tricornes sweeping the ground, waited in that uncomfortable position until the gilded coach and the men in gorgeous blue and gold liveries were swallowed in the gloom of the chestnut avenue; then it broke up into isolated groups. Lydie had done her duty as hostess; she had taken such leave as etiquette demanded from Charles Edward Stuart and his friends. Coaches and chairs came up to the perron in quick succession now, bearing the adventurers away on this, the first stage of their hazardous expedition. When would they sup again in such luxury? when would the frou-frou of silk, the flutter of fans, the sound of dance music once more pleasantly tickle their ears? To-morrow, and for many a long day to come it would be hurried meals in out-of-the-way places, the call to horse, the clink of arms.

Puppets! puppets all! for what did it matter?

Lydie would have loved to have lingered out on the terrace awhile longer. The oak-leaved geraniums down at the foot of the terrace steps threw an intoxicating lemon-scented fragrance in the air, the row of stunted orange trees still bore a few tardy blossoms, and in the copse yonder, away from the din and the bustle made by the marionettes, it must be delicious to wander on the carpet of moss and perchance to hear the melancholy note of a nightingale.

"Do you think not, Mademoiselle, that this night air is treacherous?" said Lord Eglinton, with his accustomed diffidence. "You seem to be shivering; will you allow me the honour of bringing your cloak?"

She thanked him quite kindly. Somehow his gentle voice did not jar on her mood. Since Gaston was not there, she felt that she would sooner have this unobtrusive, pleasant man beside her than any one else. He seemed to have something womanish and tender in his feeble nature which his mother lacked. Perhaps milady had divested herself of her natural attributes in order to grace her son with them, since she had been unable to instil more manly qualities into him.

But Lydie's heart ached for a sight of Gaston. The clock in the tower of the old château chimed the hour before midnight. It was but half an hour since she had parted from him on the steps of the alcove; she remembered quite distinctly hearing the bracket clock close by strike half-past ten, at the same moment as Pompadour's shrill laugh broke upon her ear.

Half an hour? Why, it seemed a lifetime since then; and while she had made her bow to the Stuart Prince and then to King Louis, while she had allowed the unseen giant to move her from place to place on a string, perhaps Gaston had been seeking for her, perhaps his heart had longed for her too, and a sting of jealousy of her multifarious social duties was even now marring the glory of happy memories.

Without another moment's hesitation she turned her back on the peaceful gloom of the night, on the silver crescent moon, the fragrance of carnations and orange-blossoms, and walked quickly up the perron steps with a hasty: "You are right, milor, the night air is somewhat chilling and my guests will be awaiting me," thrown over her shoulder at her bashful cavalier.

Beyond the noble entrance doors the vast hall was now practically deserted, save for a group of flunkeys, gorgeous and solemn, who stood awaiting the departure of their respective masters. At the farther end which led to the main corridor, Lydie, to her chagrin, caught sight of Lady Eglinton's brobdingnagian back.

"What an obsession!" she sighed, and hoped that milady would fail to notice her. Already she was planning hasty flight along a narrow passage, when a question authoritatively put by her ladyship to a magnificent person clad in a purple livery with broad white facings arrested her attention.

"Is your master still in the boudoir, do you know?"

"I do not know, Mme. la Marquise," the man replied. "I have not seen M. le Comte since half an hour."

The purple livery with broad white facings was that of the Comte de Stainville.

"I have a message for M. le Comte from Mme. de Pompadour," said Lady Eglinton carelessly. "I'll find him, I daresay."

And she turned into the great corridor.

Lydie no longer thought of flight; an unexplainable impulse caught her to change her mind, and to follow in Lady Eglinton's wake. She could not then have said if "le petit Anglais" was still near her not. She had for the moment forgotten his insignificant existence.

There was an extraordinary feeling of unreality about herself and her movements, about the voluminous person ahead clad in large-flowered azure brocade and closely followed by a stiff automaton in purple and white; they seemed to be leading her along some strange and unexpected paths, at the end of which Lydie somehow felt sure that grinning apes would be awaiting her.

Anon Lady Eglinton paused, with her hand on the handle of a door; she caught sight of Mlle. d'Aumont and seemed much surprised to see her there. She called to her by name, in that harsh voice which Lydie detested, whilst the obsequious automaton came forward and relieved her from the trouble of turning that handle herself.

"Allow me, milady."

The door flew open, the flunkey at the same moment also drew a heavy curtain aside.

Lydie had just come up quite close, in answer to Lady Eglinton's call. She was standing facing the door when Bénédict threw it open, announcing with mechanical correctness of attitude:

"Mme. la Marquise d'Eglinton, M. le Comte!"

At first Lydie only saw Gaston as he turned to face the intruders. His face was flushed, and he muttered a quickly-suppressed oath. But already she had guessed, even before Lady Eglinton's strident voice had set her every nerve a-tingling.

"Mlle. de Saint Romans!" said milady, with a shrill laugh, "a thousand pardons! I had a message from Mme. de Pompadour for M. le Comte de Stainville, and thought to find him alone. A thousand pardons, I beg – the intrusion was involuntary – and the message unimportant – I'll deliver it when Monsieur is less pleasantly engaged."

Lydie at that moment could not have stirred one limb, if her very life had depended on a movement from her. The feeling of unreality had gone. It was no longer that. It was a grim, hideous, awful reality. That beautiful woman there was reality, and real, too, were the glowing eyes that flashed defiance at milady, the lips parted for that last kiss which the flunkey's voice had interrupted, the stray black curls which had escaped from the trammels of the elaborate coiffure and lay matted on the damp forehead.

And those roses, too, which had adorned her corsage, now lying broken and trampled on the floor, the candles burning dimly in their sockets, and Gaston's look of wrath, quickly followed by one of fear – all – all that was real!

Real to the awful shame of it all – milady's sneer of triumph, the oath which had risen to Gaston's lips, the wooden figure of the lacquey standing impassive at the door!

Instinctively Lydie's hand flew to her lips; oh, that she could have wiped out the last, lingering memory of that kiss. She, the proud and reserved vestal, a Diana chaste and cold, with lips now for ever polluted by contact with those of a liar. A liar, a traitor, a sycophant! She lashed her haughty spirit into fury, the better to feel the utter degradation of her own abasement.

She did not speak. What could she say! One look at Gaston's face and she understood that her humiliation was complete; his eyes did not even seek her pardon, they expressed neither sorrow nor shame, only impotent wrath and fear of baffled ambition. Not before all these people would she betray herself, before that beautiful rival, or that vulgar

intrigante

, not before Gaston or his lacquey, and beyond that mechanical movement of hand to lips, beyond one short flash of unutterable pride and contempt, she remained silent and rigid, whilst her quick eyes took in a complete mental vision of that never to-be-forgotten picture – the dimly-lighted boudoir, the defiant figure of Irène de Saint Romans, the crushed roses on the floor.

Then with a heart-broken sigh unheard by the other actors in this moving tableaux, and covering her face with her hands, she began to walk rapidly down the corridor.

CHAPTER IX

THE WINNING HAND

But Lydie d'Aumont had not gone five paces before she heard a quick, sharp call, followed by the rustle of silk on the marble floor.

The next moment she felt a firm, hot grip on her wrist, and her left hand was forcibly drawn away from her face, whilst an eager voice spoke quick, vehement words, the purport of which failed at first to reach her brain.

"You shall not go, Mlle. d'Aumont," were the first coherent words which she seemed to understand – "you cannot – it is not just, not fair until you have heard!"

"There is nothing which I need hear," interrupted Lydie coldly, the moment she realized that it was Irène de Saint Romans who was addressing her; "and I pray you to let me go."

"Nay! but you shall hear, you must!" rejoined the other without releasing her grasp on the young girl's wrist. Her hand was hot, and her fingers had the strength of intense excitement. Lydie could not free herself, strive how she might.

"Do you not see that this is most unfair?" continued Irène with great volubility. "Am I to be snubbed like some kitchen wench caught kissing behind doorways? Look at milady Eglinton and her ill-natured sneer. I'll not tolerate it, nor your looks of proud contempt! I'll not – I'll not! Gaston! Gaston!" she now exclaimed, turning to de Stainville, who was standing, silent and sullen, whilst he saw his wife gradually lashing herself into wrathful agitation at his own indifference and Lydie's cold disdain. "If you have a spark of courage left in you, tell that malicious

intrigante

and this scornful minx that if I were to spend the whole evening in the boudoir

en tête-à-tête

with you, aye! and behind closed doors if I chose who shall have a word to say, when I am in the company of my own husband?"

"Your husband!"

The ejaculation came from Lady Eglinton's astonished lips. Lydie had not stirred. She did not seem to have heard, and certainly Irène's triumphant announcement left her as cold, as impassive as before. What did it matter, after all, what special form Gaston's lies to her had assumed? Nothing that he or Irène said or did could add to his baseness and infamy.

"Aye, my husband, milady!" continued the other more calmly, as she finally released Lydie's wrist and cast it, laughing, from her. "I am called Mme. la Comtesse de Stainville, and will be called so in the future openly. Now you may rejoin your guests, Mlle. d'Aumont; my reputation stands as far beyond reproach as did your own before you spent a mysterious half hour with my husband behind the curtains of an alcove."

She turned to de Stainville, who, in spite of his wife's provocative attitude, had remained silent, cursing the evil fate which had played him this trick, cursing the three women who were both the cause and the witnesses of his discomfiture.

"Your arm, Gaston!" she said peremptorily; "and you, Benedict, call your master's coach and my chair. Mlle. d'Aumont, your servant. If I have been the means of dissipating a happy illusion, you may curse me now, but you will bless me to-morrow. Gaston has been false to you – he is not over true to me – but he is my husband, and as such I must claim him. For the sake of his schemes, of his ambitions, I kept our marriage a secret so that he might rise to higher places than I had the power to give him. When your disdainful looks classed me with a flirty kitchen-wench I rebelled at last. I trust that you are proud enough not to vent your disappointment on Gaston; but if you do, 'tis no matter; I'll find means of consoling him."

She made the young girl a low and sweeping curtesy in the most approved style demanded by the elabourate etiquette of the time. There was a gleam of mocking triumph in her eyes, which she did not attempt to conceal, and which suddenly stung Lydie's pride to the quick.

It is strange indeed that often at a moment when a woman's whole happiness is destroyed with one blow, when a gigantic cataclysm revolutionises with one fell swoop her entire mode of thought, dispels all her dreams and shatters her illusions, it is always the tiny final pin-prick which causes her the most acute pain and influences the whole of her subsequent conduct.

It was Irène's mocking curtsey which roused Lydie from her mental torpor, because it brought her – as it were – in actual physical contact with all that she would have to endure openly in the future, as apart from the hidden misery of her heart.

Gaston's shamed face was no longer the only image which seared her eyes and brain. The world, her own social world, seemed all at once to reawaken before her. That world would sneer even as Irène de Stainville sneered; it would laugh at and enjoy her own discomfiture. She – Lydie d'Aumont – the proud and influential daughter of the Prime Minister of France, whom flatterers and sycophants approached mentally on bended knees, for whom suitors hardly dared even to sigh, she had been tricked and fooled like any silly country mouse whose vanity had led to her own abasement.

Half an hour ago in the fullness of her newly-found happiness she had flaunted her pride and her love before those who hated and envied her. To-morrow – nay, within an hour – this humiliating scene would be the talk of Paris and Versailles. Lydie's burning ears seemed even now to hear the Pompadour retailing it with many embellishments, which would bring a coarse laugh to the lips of the King and an ill-natured jest to those of her admirers; she could hear the jabbering crowd, could feel the looks of compassion or sarcasm aimed at her as soon at this tit-bit of society scandal had been bruited abroad.

The scene itself had become real and vivid to her; the marble corridor, the flickering candles, the flunkey's impassive face; she understood that the beautiful woman before her was in fact and deed the wife of Gaston de Stainville. She even contrived to perceive the humour of Lady Eglinton's completely bewildered expression, the blank astonishment of her round, bulgy eyes, and close to her she saw "le petit Anglais," self-effaced as usual, and looking almost as guilty, as shamefaced as Gaston.

Lydie turned to him and placed a cool, steady hand upon his sleeve.

"Madame la Comtesse de Stainville," she then said with perfect calm, "I fear me I must beg of your courtesy to tarry awhile longer, whilst I offer you an explanation to which I feel you are entitled. Just now I was somewhat surprised because your news was sudden – and it is my turn to ask your pardon, although my fault – if fault there be – rests on a misapprehension. M. le Comte de Stainville's amours or his marriage are no concern of mine. True, he begged for my influence and fawned upon my favour just now, for his ambition soared to the post of High Controller of the Finances of France. That appointment rests with the Duc, my father, who no doubt will bestow it on him whom he thinks most worthy. But it were not fair to me, if you left me now thinking that the announcement of your union with a gentleman whose father was the friend of mine could give me aught but pleasure. Permit me to congratulate you, Madame, on the choice of a lord and master, a helpmeet no doubt. You are indeed well matched. I am all the more eager to offer you my good wishes as I have been honoured to-night with a proposal which has greatly flattered me. My lord the Marquis of Eglinton has asked me to be his wife!"

Once more she turned her head toward the young Englishman and challenged a straight look from his eyes. He did not waver and she was satisfied. Her instinct had not misled her, for he expressed no astonishment, only a sort of dog-like gratitude and joy as, having returned her gaze quite firmly, he now slowly raised his arm bringing her hand on a level with his lips.

Lady Eglinton also displayed sufficient presence of mind not to show any surprise. She perhaps alone of all those present fully realized that Lydie had been wounded to the innermost depths of her heart, and that she herself owed her own and her son's present triumph to the revolt of mortified pride.

What Gaston thought and felt exactly it were difficult to say. He held women in such slight esteem, and his own vanity was receiving so severe a blow, that, no doubt, he preferred to think that Lydie, like himself, had no power of affection and merely bestowed her heart there where self-interest called.

Irène, on the other hand, heaved a sigh of relief; the jealous suspicions which had embittered the last few days were at last dispelled. Hers was a simple, shallow nature that did not care to look beyond the obvious. She certainly appeared quite pleased at Lydie's announcement, and if remorse at her precipitancy did for one brief second mar the fullness of her joy, she quickly cast it from her, not having yet had time to understand the future and more serious consequences of her impulsive avowal.

She wanted to go up to Lydie and to offer her vapid expressions of goodwill, but Gaston, heartily tired of the prolongation of this scene, dragged her somewhat roughly away.

From the far distance there came the cry of the flunkeys.

"The chair of Mlle. de Saint Romans!"

"The coach of M. le Comte de Stainville!"

M. Bénédict, resplendent in purple and white, reappeared at the end of the corridor, with Irène's hood and cloak. Gaston, with his wife on his arm, turned on his heel and quickly walked down the corridor.

Milady, puzzled, bewildered, boundlessly overjoyed yet fearing to trust her luck too far, had just a sufficient modicum of tact left in her to retire discreetly within the boudoir.

Lydie suddenly found herself alone in this wide corridor with the man whom she had so impulsively dragged into her life. She looked round her somewhat helplessly, and her eyes encountered those of her future lord fixed upon hers with that same air of dog-like gentleness which she knew so well and which always irritated her.

"Milor," she said very coldly, "I must thank you for your kind coöperation just now. That you expressed neither surprise nor resentment does infinite credit to your chivalry."

"If I was a little surprised, Mademoiselle," he said, haltingly, "I was too overjoyed to show it, and – and I certainly felt no resentment."

He came a step nearer to her. But for this she was not prepared, and drew back with a quick movement and a sudden stiffening of her figure.

"I hope you quite understood milor, that there is no desire on my part to hold you to this bond," she said icily. "I am infinitely grateful to you for the kind way in which you humoured my impulse to-night, and if you will have patience with me but a very little while, I promise you that I will find an opportunity for breaking, without too great a loss of dignity, these bonds which already must be very irksome to you."

"Nay, Mademoiselle," he said gently, "you are under a misapprehension. Believe me, you would find it well-nigh impossible to – to – er – to alter your plans now without loss of dignity, and – er – er – I assure you that the bonds are not irksome to me."

"You would hold me to this bargain, then?"

"For your sake, Mademoiselle, as well as mine, we must now both be held to it."

"It seems unfair on you, milor."

"On me, Mademoiselle?"

"Yes, on you," she repeated, with a thought more gentleness in her voice; "you are young, milor; you are rich – soon you will regret the sense of honour which ties you to a woman who has only yielded her hand to you out of pique! Nay, I'll not deceive you," she added quickly, noting the sudden quiver of the kind little face at her stinging words. "I have no love for you, milor – all that was young and fresh, womanly and tender in my heart was buried just here to-night."

And with a mournful look she glanced round at the cold marble of the walls, the open door to that boudoir beyond, the gilded sconces which supported the dimly-burning candles. Then, smitten with sudden remorse, she said eagerly, with one of those girlish impulses which rendered her domineering nature so peculiarly attractive:

"But if I can give you no love, milor, Heaven and my father's indulgence have given me something which I know men hold far greater of importance than a woman's heart. I have influence, boundless influence, as you know – the State appointed Controller of Finance will be the virtual ruler of France, his position will give him power beyond the dreams of any man's ambition. My father will gladly give the post to my husband and – "

But here a somewhat trembling hand was held deprecatingly toward her.

"Mademoiselle, I entreat you," said Lord Eglinton softly, "for the sake of your own dignity and – and mine, do not allow your mind to dwell on such matters. Believe me, I am fully conscious of the honour which you did me just now in deigning to place your trust in me. That I have – have loved you, Mlle. Lydie,"