"Monsieur," said she, "I have no wish to make you remiss in your duty; carry out your instructions, whatever they may be."
"Madame, I am as yet, I am happy to say, entirely unskilled in the persecution of women, and know even less of the method to be employed in insulting a princess. I have the honor therefore to repeat to your Highness what I have already said to the princess dowager, that I am your very humble servant. Deign to give me your word that you will not leave the château unaccompanied by me, and I will relieve you of my presence, which, as I can well understand, is hateful to your Highness."
"But in that case, monsieur," said the princess, quickly, "you will not carry out your orders."
"I shall do what my conscience tells me that I ought to do."
"Monsieur de Canolles, I swear that I will not leave Chantilly without giving you due notice."
"Then, madame," said Canolles, bowing to the ground, "forgive me for having been the involuntary cause of arousing your wrath for an instant. Your Highness will not see me again until you are pleased to summon me."
"I thank you, baron," said the voice, with a joyful inflection, which seemed to find an echo in the passage. "Go, go! I thank you; to-morrow I shall have the pleasure of seeing you again."
This time the baron recognized, beyond possibility of mistake, the voice, the eyes, and the unspeakably delicious smile of the fascinating being who slipped between his fingers, so to speak, the night that the courier brought him the order from the Duc d'Épernon. A last glance at the portrait, dimly lighted as it was, showed the baron, whose eyes were beginning to be accustomed to the half-darkness, the aquiline nose of the Maillé family, the black hair and deep-set eyes of the princess; while the woman before him, who had just played through the first act of the difficult part she had undertaken, had the eye level with the face, the straight nose with dilated nostrils, the mouth dimpled at the corners by frequent smiling, and the plump cheeks which denote anything rather than the habit of serious meditation.
Canolles knew all that he wished to know; he bowed once more as respectfully as if he still believed that he was in the princess's presence, and withdrew to the apartment set apart for him.