He held her hand as he looked up with a face radiant with joy. "I
will surely come, Angelique; but tell me--"
She interrupted him laughingly: "No; I will tell you nothing till
you come! So good-by till then."
He would fain have prolonged the interview; but she capriciously
shook the reins, and with a silvery laugh rode through the gateway
and into the city. In a few minutes she dismounted at her own home,
and giving her horse in charge of a groom, ran lightly up the broad
steps into the house.
The family mansion of the Des Meloises was a tall and rather
pretentious edifice overlooking the fashionable Rue St. Louis.
The house was, by a little artifice on the part of Angelique, empty
of visitors this evening. Even her brother, the Chevalier des
Meloises, with whom she lived, a man of high life and extreme
fashion, was to-night enjoying the more congenial society of the
officers of the Regiment de Bearn. At this moment, amid the clash
of glasses and the bubbling of wine, the excited and voluble Gascons
were discussing in one breath the war, the council, the court, the
ladies, and whatever gay topic was tossed from end to end of the
crowded mess-table.
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