show his danger."

"Then let me ask you how you expect to save him from it."

"Suppose I do not choose to answer," she replied, with the haughty air
that women often assume to hide an emotion. "What right have you to know
my secrets?"

"The right of a man who loves you."

"Already?" she said. "No, you do not love me. I am only an object of
passing gallantry to you,--that is all. I am clear-sighted; did I not
penetrate your disguise at once? A woman who knows anything of
good society could not be misled, in these days, by a pupil of the
Polytechnique who uses choice language, and conceals as little as you do
the manners of a _grand seigneur_ under the mask of a Republican. There
is a trifle of powder left in your hair, and a fragrance of nobility
clings to you which a woman of the world cannot fail to detect.
Therefore, fearing that the man whom you saw accompanying me, who has
all the shrewdness of a woman, might make the same discovery, I sent him
away. Monsieur, let me tell you that a true Republican officer just from
the Polytechnique would not have made love to me as you have done, and
would not have taken me for a pretty adventuress. Allow me, Monsieur de
Bauvan, to preach you a little sermon from a woman's point of view. Are
you too juvenile to know that of all the creatures of my sex the most
difficult to subdue is that same adventuress,--she whose price is
ticketed and who is weary of pleasure. That sort of woman requires, they
tell me, constant seduction; she yields only to her own caprices; any
attempt to please her argues, I should suppose, great conceit on the
part of a man. But let us put aside that class of women, among whom you
have been good enough to rank me; you ought to understand that a young
woman, handsome, brilliant, and of noble birth (for, I suppose, you will
grant me those advantages), does not sell herself, and can only be won
by the man who loves her in one way. You understand me? If she loves
him and is willing to commit a folly, she must be justified by great and
heroic reasons. Forgive me this logic, rare in my sex; but for the sake
of your happiness,--and my own," she added, dropping her head,--"I will
not allow either of us to deceive the other, nor will I permit you to
think that Mademoiselle de Verneuil, angel or devil, maid or wife, is
capable of being seduced by commonplace gallantry."

"Mademoiselle," said the marquis, whose surprise, though he concealed
it, was extreme, and