nare. He had yielded like a
child in Sabine's boudoir. Marianne left that soiree with unbounded
delight. She had recovered all her hopes and regained her _luck_. The
next day she would again see Rosas. She passed the night in dreams.
Light and gold reigned upon her life. She was radiant on awaking.

Her uncle, on seeing her, found her looking younger and superb.

"You are as beautiful as a Correggio, who though a voluptuous painter,
must have been talented. You ought to pose to me for a Saint Cecilia. It
would be magnificent, with a nimbus--"

"Oh! let your saint come later," said Marianne, "I haven't time."

Simon Kayser did not ask the young woman, moreover, why "she had not
time." Marianne was perfectly free. Each managed his affairs in his own
way. Such, in fact, was one of the favorite axioms of this painter, a
man of principle.

Marianne breakfasted quickly and early, and after dressing herself,
during which she studied coquettish effects while standing before her
mirror, she left the house, jumped into a cab and drove to the Hotel
Continental. With proud mien and tossing her head, she asked for the
duke as if he belonged to her. She was almost inclined to exclaim before
all the people: "I am his mistress!"

But she suddenly turned pale upon hearing that Monsieur de Rosas had
left.

"What! gone?"

Gone thus, suddenly, unceremoniously, without notice, without a word? It
was not possible.

They were obliged to confirm this news to her several times at the hotel
office. Monsieur le duc had that very morning ordered a coupe to take
him to catch a train for Calais. It was true that he had left some
baggage behind, but at the same time he notified them that they would
perhaps have to forward it to him in England later.

Marianne listened in stupid astonishment. She became livid under her
little veil.

"Monsieur de Rosas did not receive a telegram?"

"Yes, madame."

"Ah!"

Something serious had, perhaps, suddenly intervened in the duke's life.
Nevertheless, this abrupt departure without notification, following the
exciting soiree of the previous day, greatly astonished this woman who
but now believed herself securely possessed of Jose.

"Nonsense!" she thought. "He was afraid of me--Yes, that's it!--Of
course, he was afraid of me. He loves me much, too much, and distrusts
himself. He has gone away."

She commenced to laugh uneasily as she got into her carriage again.

"Assuredly, that is part of my