of battle, and then we 'll celebrate the joyous
occasion with a little supper."

The Count's proposal met with no opposition--least of all from Dieppe,
who suddenly remembered that he was famished.

The next morning, the garden of the Castle presented a pleasing sight.
Workmen were busily engaged in pulling down the barricade, while the
Count and Countess sat on a seat hard by. Sometimes they watched the
operations, sometimes the Count read in a confidential and tender voice
from a little sheaf of papers which he held in his hand. When he
ceased reading, the Countess would murmur, "Beautiful!" and the Count
shake his head in a poet's affectation of dissatisfaction with his
verse. Then they would fall to watching the work of demolition again.
At last the Count remarked:

"But where are Lucia and our friend Dieppe?"

"Walking together down there by the stream," answered the Countess.
And, after a pause, she turned to him, and, in a very demure fashion,
hazarded a suggestion. "Do you know, Andrea, I think Lucia and Captain
Dieppe are inclined to take to one another very much?"

"It 's an uncommonly sudden attachment," laughed the Count.

"Yes," agreed his wife, biting her lip. "It 's certainly sudden. But
consider in what an interesting way their acquaintance began! Do you
know anything about him?"

"I know he 's a gentleman, and a clever fellow," returned the Count.
"And from time to time he makes some money, I believe."

"Lucia's got some money," mused the Countess.

Down by the stream they walked, side by side, showing indeed (as the
Countess remarked) every sign of taking to one another very much.

"You really think we shall hear no more of Paul de Roustache?" asked
Lucia.

"I 'm sure of it; and I think M. Guillaume will let me alone too.
Indeed there remains only one question."

"What's that?" asked Lucia.

"How you are going to treat me," said the Captain. "Think what I have
suffered already!"

"I could n't help that," she cried. "My word was absolutely pledged to
Emilia. 'Whatever happens,' I said to her, 'I promise I won't tell
anybody that I 'm not the Countess.' If I had n't promised that, she
could n't have gone to Rome at all, you know. She 'd have died sooner
than let Andrea think she had left the Castle."

"You remember what you said to her. Do you remember what you said to
me?"

"When?"

"When we talked in the hut in the hollow of the hill. You said you
would be all that