replied to his "ventilations." But his Lizzy cut him short when he began
his recital:

"I don't want to hear anything more about the man. He has thrown away a
prize richer than his ambition will ever gain, even if it gained him a
throne."

"That it can't gain him in the old country. The people are loyal to the
present dynasty, whatever you may be told to the contrary."

"Don't be so horribly literal, Frank; that subject is done with. How was
the Duchess of ------ dressed?"

But when the Colonel had retired to what the French call the cabinet de
traivail--and which he more accurately termed his "smoke den"--and
there indulged in the cigar which, despite his American citizenship,
was forbidden in the drawing-room of the tyrant who ruled his life,
Mrs. Morley took from her desk a letter received three days before,
and brooded over it intently, studying every word. When she had
thus reperused it, her tears fell upon the page. "Poor Isaura!" she
muttered--"poor Isaura! I know she loves him--and how deeply a nature
like hers can love! But I must break it to her. If I did not, she would
remain nursing a vain dream, and refuse every chance of real happiness
for the sake of nursing it." Then she mechanically folded up the
letter--I need not say it was from Graham Vane--restored it to the desk,
and remained musing till the Colonel looked in at the door and said
peremptorily, "Very late--come to bed."

The next day Madame Savarin called on Isaura.

"Chere enfant," said she, "I have bad news for you. Poor Gustave is very
ill--an attack of the lungs and fever; you know how delicate he is."

"I am sincerely grieved," said Isaura, in earnest tender tones; "it must
be a very sudden attack: he was here last Thursday."

"The malady only declared itself yesterday morning, but surely you must
have observed how ill he has been looking for several days past? It
pained me to see him."

"I did not notice any change in him," said Isaura, somewhat
conscience-stricken. Wrapt in her own happy thoughts, she would not have
noticed change in faces yet more familiar to her than that of her young
admirer.

"Isaura," said Madame Savarin, "I suspect there are moral causes for our
friend's failing health. Why should I disguise my meaning? You know well
how madly he is in love with you, and have you denied him hope?"

"I like M. Rameau as a friend; I admire him--at times I pity him."

"Pity is akin to love."

"I doubt the truth of that sayi