at this suggestion. "Come, for my sake, Caroline!
Do up that disordered hair; I shall be proud of you, my Caroline; there
is not a lady in New France can match you when you look yourself, my
pretty Caroline!"

"Francois," said she, with a sad smile, "it is long since you flattered
me thus! But I will arrange my hair for you alone," added she, blushing,
as with deft fingers she twisted her raven locks into a coronal about
her head. "I would once have gone with you to the end of the world to
hear you say you were proud of me. Alas! you can never be proud of me
any more, as in the old happy days at Grand Pre. Those few brief days of
love and joy can never return--never, never!"

Bigot stood silent, not knowing what to say or do. The change from the
bacchanalian riot in the great hall to the solemn pathos and woe of the
secret chamber sobered him rapidly. Even his obduracy gave way at last.
"Caroline," said he, taking both her hands in his, "I will not urge you
longer. I am called bad, and you think me so; but I am not brutal. It
was a promise made over the wine. Varin, the drunken beast, called you
Queen Vashti, and challenged me to show your beauty to them; and I swore
not one of their toasted beauties could match my fair Acadienne."

"Did the Sieur Varin call me Queen Vashti? Alas! he was a truer prophet
than he knew," replied she, with ineffable sadness. "Queen Vashti
refused to obey even her king, when commanded to unveil her face to the
drunken nobles. She was deposed, and another raised to her place. Such
may be my fate, Francois."

"Then you will not go, Caroline?"

"No; kill me if you like, and bear my dead body into the hall, but
living, I can never show my face again before men--hardly before you,
Francois," added she, blushing, as she hid her tearful eyes on his
shoulder.

"Well then, Caroline," replied, he, really admiring her spirit and
resolution, "they shall finish their carouse without seeing you. The
wine has flowed to-night in rivers, but they shall swim in it without
you."

"And tears have flowed down here," said she, sadly,--"oh, so bitter! May
you never taste their bitterness, Francois!"

Bigot paced the chamber with steadier steps than he had entered it. The
fumes were clearing from his brain; the song that had caught the ear of
Colonel Philibert as he approached the Chateau was resounding at
this moment. As it ceased Bigot heard the loud impatient knocking of
Philibert at the outer door.