e of those deep
silences that are crowded with thoughts. The countess examined Paz
covertly, and Paz observed her in a mirror. Buried in an armchair like
a man digesting his dinner, the image of a husband or an indifferent
old man, Paz crossed his hands upon his stomach and twirled his thumbs
mechanically, looking stupidly at them.

"Why don't you tell me something good of Adam?" cried Clementine
suddenly. "Tell me that he is not volatile, you who know him so well."

The cry was fine.

"Now is the time," thought poor Paz, "to put an insurmountable barrier
between us. Tell you good of Adam?" he said aloud. "I love him; you
would not believe me; and I am incapable of telling you harm. My
position is very difficult between you."

Clementine lowered her head and looked down at the tips of his varnished
boots.

"You Northern men have nothing but physical courage," she said
complainingly; "you have no constancy in your opinions."

"How will you amuse yourself alone, madame?" said Paz, assuming a
careless air.

"Are not you going to keep me company?"

"Excuse me for leaving you."

"What do you mean? Where are you going?"

The thought of a heroic falsehood had come into his head.

"I--I am going to the Circus in the Champs Elysees; it opens to-night,
and I can't miss it."

"Why not?" said Clementine, questioning him by a look that was
half-anger.

"Must I tell you why?" he said, coloring; "must I confide to you what I
hide from Adam, who thinks my only love is Poland."

"Ah! a secret in our noble captain?"

"A disgraceful one--which you will perhaps understand, and pity."

"You, disgraced?"

"Yes, I, Comte Paz; I am madly in love with a girl who travels all over
France with the Bouthor family,--people who have the rival circus to
Franconi; but they play only at fairs. I have made the director at the
Cirque-Olympique engage her."

"Is she handsome?"

"To my thinking," said Paz, in a melancholy tone. "Malaga (that's her
stage name) is strong, active, and supple. Why do I prefer her to all
other women in the world?--well, I can't tell you. When I look at her,
with her black hair tied with a blue satin ribbon, floating on her bare
and olive-colored shoulders, and when she is dressed in a white tunic
with a gold edge, and a knitted silk bodice that makes her look like a
living Greek statue, and when I see her carrying those flags in her hand
to the sound of martial music, and jumping through the paper hoops