"Precisely!"

"Very well, then, and what about me, my dear fellow? Do you think I am marriageable, then? Can you imagine me with my wretched fifteen hundred a year endeavouring to make Bijou happy? Yes, can you just imagine it now?--a house at a hundred a year or so--petroleum lamps, c.o.ke fires, etc.--that _would_ be delicious."

"And yet you are in love with her?"

"Excuse me, I did not say that I was in love with Bijou. I don't really know; all I can say is, that she has taken my fancy tremendously, and that, as I simply cannot marry her, I am wretchedly unhappy."

"And you don't think she cares for you?"

"Not the least bit in the world! She has never tried even to deceive me on that point. 'Good-morning! Good-night! What a fine day it is.'--that's the sort of palpitating dialogue which goes on every day between us. You see, therefore, that you have no reason to have a spite against me?"

"I beg your pardon, Jean, my dear fellow, but I firmly believed that you were the great favourite."

M. de Rueille broke off suddenly, and appeared to be straining his ears.

"Ah!" he said, "there she is!"

Bijou was just coming out of the stable, followed, of course, by Pierrot.

She tripped daintily across towards the two men, examining them in her calm, smiling way.

"Whatever's the matter with you both?" she asked; "you look--I don't know how!"

V.

BIJOU was in the dining-room, arranging the flowers on the table for dinner, whilst in the butler's pantry the servants were polishing up the large silver dishes until they shone brilliantly.

"Get into your coat!" said the butler to the footman; "there's a carriage coming slowly up the avenue. Oh, you've got plenty of time, it isn't here yet."

"Whose carriage is it?" said the footman, looking through the window.

"I don't know it; it's a fine-looking turn-out, anyhow. It might very well be the owner of The Noriniere."

"My goodness! it's a clinking turn-out."

"Oh, he can afford it."

"He's got some money, then?"

"Why, yes, an awful lot; he's got about sixteen thousand a year."

"Do you know him, then?"

"My wife was kitchen-maid at his place before I married her--a good master he is, always pleasant, and not at all near--you'd better start now if you want to get to the steps before he's there."

A minute before, Bijou, finding that she was short of flowers, had run out into the garden, and, springing across the path, had pushed her way into the middle of a rose-bed, and was now cutting away mercilessly. She was so absorbed that she did not hear the carriage, which was coming up the drive, and which went round the lawn, and pulled up in front of the stone steps. When at last she did happen to look up, she saw, a few steps away from her, a tall gentleman standing gazing at her with a most rapturous expression.

The fact was that Bijou, in her cotton dress, with wide pink stripes, and her little ap.r.o.n trimmed with Valenciennes, was really very pretty to look at, foraging about amongst the flowers.

When she discovered that she was being gazed at in this way, her tea-rose complexion took a deeper tint, and she looked confused and embarra.s.sed, as she stood there facing the gentleman, who was still contemplating her without saying a word.

He was a man of between fifty-five and sixty, tall, slender, distinguished-looking, and elegant, and with a very young-looking figure for his years. His face, which was intelligent and refined, had also an almost youthful expression about it, just tinged with a shade of melancholy. As Bijou remained where she was, and appeared to be hesitating and not quite at her ease, the visitor approached, and, raising his hat, said in a very gentle voice:

"Excuse me, mademoiselle, but are you not Denyse de Courtaix?"

Bijou, with her frank, honest expression, looked straight into the eyes fixed so curiously upon her, and answered, smiling:

"Yes, and you?--you are Monsieur de Clagny, are you not?"

"How did you know?"

Denyse sprang out of the rose-bed on to the garden-path, and then, without answering the question in a direct way, she said, with the most trusting, happy look in her eyes:

"Oh! how glad grandmamma will be to see you, and Uncle Alexis, too; ever since they heard that you were coming back to live here, they have talked of nothing else. Let's go at once to find grandmamma."

She started off, leading the way, looking most graceful and supple, as she pa.s.sed through the large rooms with that gliding movement which was one of her greatest charms.

The marchioness was not in the room where she was usually to be found.

Bijou rang the bell, and requested the servant to find Madame de Bracieux. She then took a seat opposite M. de Clagny, and examined him attentively.

"Paul de Rueille was quite right after all," she said, "when he told me that I had seen you long ago--I recognise you." She gazed with her bright eyes more fixedly into the count's, and repeated pensively: "I certainly do recognise you."

"Well, I confess, in all sincerity," said M. de Clagny, "that if I had met you anywhere else than at Bracieux, I should not have recognised _you_--you are so much bigger, you know, and then, so much more beautiful that, with the exception of the lovely violet eyes, which have not changed, there is nothing remaining of the little baby-girl of years ago."

"The name which you gave me still remains."

"The name? what name?" he asked, in surprise.

"Bijou! don't you remember? it seems that it was you who used to call me that."

"Yes, that's true! you seemed to me such a fragile little thing, so adorable and so rare--a bijou in fact, an exquisite little bijou. And so they have continued to call you by that name--it suits you, too, wonderfully well."

"I don't think so! I am afraid it is rather ridiculous to be still _Bijou_ at the age of twenty-one, for, you know, I am twenty-one now."

"Is it possible?"

"Very possible! in four years from now I shall be quite an old maid!"

The count looked at Bijou with an admiration which he did not attempt to dissimulate, as he answered emphatically:

"_You_ an old maid? oh, never in the world, never!"

Madame de Bracieux was just entering the room.

"How glad I am to see you!" she said, looking delighted, and holding out her hands to her visitor.