Captain George bowed low, with the mask, still leaning on his arm curtsied to the ground.
“Highness,” said he, “I shall have the honour! It is a mere duty to serve under his orders but it becomes a pleasure when Monsieur le Duc commands in person.”
“And to supper afterwards, of course,” added very graciously a lady who was hanging on the Regent’s arm, and who carried her mask in her hand. “Captain George is always welcome, as he knows, and we shall not be more than a half-a-dozen at the outside.”
Again the Musketeer bowed low, and the Marquise, scanning the last speaker intently, could not but acknowledge that to-night Madame de Parabére looked more than usually beautiful. The brunette, too, probably overrated the charms of the blonde, the exceeding delicacy of complexion, the softness of skin, and the innocent baby face which so fascinated the Regent. Also she thought she detected on that baby face a decided preference for the Musketeer, and Madame de Montmirail was not a woman to entertain the strongest passions of her sex and leave out jealousy.
Had it not been for these suspicions, the bouquet of stephanotis might have remained all night innocuous beneath her cloak, to be consumed in the stove that warmed her chocolate when she got home. But the Marquise allowed no one to cross her designs with impunity, and watching her new enemy narrowly, began to handle her weapons and prepare for action.
The Regent had been traversing the throng of revellers with Madame de Parabére on his arm; the latter, proud of her disgrace, and exulting in her infamous position as his acknowledged mistress, had bared her face, in order to receive the full tribute of admiration which her beauty really deserved. Now, while the Duke stood still for a moment, and exchanged a few jesting compliments and well-bred sarcasms with the passing maskers, an encounter in which he acquitted himself with considerable tact and ingenuity, his companion, dearly loving mischief, turned all her batteries on Captain George.
The Marquise was, therefore, left planted as one too many; a situation to which she, the spoiled child of society, was so unaccustomed, that she could have cried with vexation, but for the revenge now literally within her grasp.
So she peered, and watched, and waited, like a Grey Musketeer skirmishing.
Madame de Parabére, observing the Regent’s attention engaged elsewhere, whispered something to George, looking insolently the while at his companion, and laughed.
Then the Marquise primed her weapon, as it were, and shook the powder well up in the pan. A leaf of the rare bouquet peeped from under its covering.