Her revenge might be fierce, and
rapid, and sure, like the revenge of a soldier; but it could never be
stealing and traitorous, and never like the revenge of a woman.
Not a word escaped her that could have given a clew to the secret with
which he had involuntarily weighted her; she only studied with interest
and keenness the face and the words of this man whom he had loved, and
from whom he had fled as criminals flee from their accusers.
"What is your name?" she asked him curtly, in one of the pauses of the
amorous and witty nonsense that circulated in the tent in which the
officers of Chasseurs were entertaining him.
"Well--some call me Seraph."
"Ah! you have petite names, then, in Albion? I should have though she
was too somber and too stiff for them. Besides?"
"Lyonnesse."
"What a droll name! What are you?"
"A soldier."
"Good! What grade?"
"A Colonel of Guards."
Cigarette gave a little whistle to herself; she remembered that a
Marshal of France had once said of a certain Chasseur, "He has the seat
of the English Guards."
"My pretty catechist, M. le Duc does not tell you his title," cried one
of the officers.
Cigarette interrupted him with a toss of her head.
"Ouf! Titles are nothing to me. I am a child of the People. So you are
a Duke, are you, M. le Seraph? Well, that is not much, to my thinking.
Bah! there is Fialin made a Duke in Paris, and there are aristocrats
here wearing privates' uniforms, and littering down their own horses.
Pages:
632
633
634
635
636
637
638
639
640
641
642
643
644
645
646
647
648
649
650
651
652
653
654
655
656