“Oh, pure magic!” ejaculated the countess and the marshal, both pallid.
“Do you know all you wished?” Balsamo asked La Dubarry.
“My lord,” said she, going to him, but in terror, “you have done me a service for which I would pay with five years of my life, or indeed I can never repay. Ask me anything you like.”
“Oh, you know we are already in account. The time is not come to settle.”
“You shall have it, were it a million—— ”
“Pshaw, countess!” exclaimed the old nobleman, “you had better look to the count for a million. One who knows—who can see what he sees, might discover gold and diamonds in the bowels of the earth as he does thoughts in the mind of man.”
“Nay, countess, I will give you the chance some day of acquitting yourself as regards me.”
“Count,” said the duke, “I am subjugated, vanquished, crushed—I believe!”
“You know you saw but that is not belief.”
“Call it what you please; I know what I shall say if magicians are spoken of before me.”