“There is an Archduke, Madame.”
“What care I for an Archduke, Nina?” said Kate, trying to smile away the awkwardness of her own disturbed manner.
“I have always believed that great folk liked each other,” said Nina, sarcastically.
“Then I must lack one element of that condition, Nina,” said Kate, good-humoredly; “but pray make my excuses,—say anything you like so that I may be left in quiet.”
“How delightful Madame's reveries must be, when she attaches such value to them!”
“Can you doubt it, Nina?” replied Kate, with a forced gayety. “A betrothed bride ought to be happy; you are always telling me so. I hear of nothing from morn till night but of rich caskets of gems and jewels; you seem to think that diamonds would throw a lustre over any gloom.”
“And would they not?” cried Nina, passionately “Has not the brow nobler and higher thoughts when encircled by a coronet like this? Does not the heart beat with greater transport beneath gems like these?” And she opened case after case of sparkling jewels as she spoke, and spread them before Kate, on the table.
“And yet I have learned to look on them calmly,” said Kate, with an expression of proud indifference.