to eyes all the power of
the infinite of the heavens reflected in them. And for speech, the least
word has irresistible might. Is not the light infused into the voice and
purple into the glances? Is not heaven within us, or do we feel that we
are in the heavens?

Vandenesse and Julie--for so she had allowed herself to be called
for the past few days by him whom she loved to speak of as
Charles--Vandenesse and Julie were talking together, but they had
drifted very far from their original subject; and if their spoken words
had grown meaningless they listened in delight to the unspoken thoughts
that lurked in the sounds. Her hand lay in his. She had abandoned it to
him without a thought that she had granted a proof of love.

Together they leaned forward to look out upon a majestic cloud country,
full of snows and glaciers and fantastic mountain peaks with gray stains
of shadow on their sides, a picture composed of sharp contrasts between
fiery red and the shadows of darkness, filling the skies with a fleeting
vision of glory which cannot be reproduced--magnificent swaddling-bands
of sunrise, bright shrouds of the dying sun. As they leaned Julie's hair
brushed lightly against Vandenesse's cheek. She felt that light contact,
and shuddered violently, and he even more, for imperceptibly they both
had reached one of those inexplicable crises when quiet has wrought
upon the senses until every faculty of perception is so keen that the
slightest shock fills the heart lost in melancholy with sadness that
overflows in tears; or raises joy to ecstasy in a heart that is lost
in the vertigo of love. Almost involuntarily Julie pressed her lover's
hand. That wooing pressure gave courage to his timidity. All the joy of
the present, all the hopes of the future were blended in the emotion
of a first caress, the bashful trembling kiss that Mme. d'Aiglemont
received upon her cheek. The slighter the concession, the more dangerous
and insinuating it was. For their double misfortune it was only too
sincere a revelation. Two noble natures had met and blended, drawn
each to each by every law of natural attraction, held apart by every
ordinance.

General d'Aiglemont came in at that very moment.

"The Ministry has gone out," he said. "Your uncle will be in the
new cabinet. So you stand an uncommonly good chance of an embassy,
Vandenesse."

Charles and Julie looked at each other and flushed red. That blush was
one more tie to unite them; there