Gilbert got down while the carriage went on.
A gardener was keeping the house which he showed to the inquirer. It belonged to St. Denis Abbey and was for sale under the decree confiscating Church property. Over against the gardener's lodge was another, a summerhouse simply overgrown with flowers. Mirabeau's passion for them made this sufficient lure; for this alone he would have taken the house.
"Is this little cottage, this Temple of Flora, on the property?" he asked.
"Yes, sir: it belongs to the big house but it is at present occupied by a lady with her child, a pretty lady, but of course she will have to go if the house and estate are bought."
"A lovely neighbor does no harm," said the count: "Let me see the interior of the house."
The rooms were lofty and elegant, the furniture fine and stylish. In the main room Mirabeau opened a window to look out and it commanded a view of the summerhouse. What was more, he had a view of a lady, sewing, half reclining, while a child of five or six played on the lawn among flowering shrubs.
It was the lady tenant.
It was not only such a pretty woman as one might imagine a Queen among the roses, but it was the living likeness of Queen Marie Antoinette and to accentuate the resemblance the boy was about the age of the Prince Royal.
Suddenly the beautiful stranger perceived that she was under observation for she uttered a faint scream of surprise, rose, called her son, and drew him inside by the hand, but not without looking back two or three times.
At this same moment Mirabeau started, for a hand was laid on his shoulder. It was the doctor who reported that the peasant's child had caught swamp fever from being set down beside a stagnant pool while the mother reaped the grass. The disease was deadly but the doctor hoped to save the sufferer by Jesuit's Bark, as quinine was still styled at this date.