“Must I say, madame?”
The cheeks of the queen assumed once more that deadly paleness, which had many times that morning alternated with a burning red.
“Did you see me?” she asked.
“Yes, your majesty, at the moment when your mask unhappily fell off.”
Marie Antoinette clasped her hands.
“Monsieur,” said she, almost sobbing, “look at me well; are you sure of what you say?”
“Madame, your features are engraved in the hearts of your subjects; to see your majesty once is to see you forever.”
“But, monsieur,” said she, “I assure you I was not at the ball at the Opera.”
“Oh, madame,” said the young man, bowing low, “has not your majesty the right to go where you please?”
“I do not ask you to find excuses for me; I only ask you to believe.”