“Bravo!” cried the crowd, designating this golden car to the jury for the first prize. Isabelle Orlandi and Jean Berlier emptied their baskets with joyful gaiety. The girl was wearing a white dress, and her bodice, half covered by a bolero, was trimmed with pleated satin of the color of mother-of-pearl. Pleasure intoxicated her, and her flushed brown cheeks betrayed her quickened pulses. The two young people reserved their hardest shots for the arrival of a few ancient crones who were not afraid to dishonor this procession of youth by their presence. They are to be met with at all fashionable promenades at Nice, at Monte Carlo, at Aix. In fact, they are apparently the same at all these functions. They try to forget or to cheat death, and their very faces adjure us to make the best of life or remind us of the threats of time. One of them was at last hit, and kept on her hat and head-dress with difficulty under the shocks of the missiles. Isabelle and Jean could no longer restrain their laughter.
Beside Alice Dulaurens, whose mauve dress trimmed with white lace enhanced her ethereal grace, Marcel felt his will weakening and his melancholy disappearing. A cloud of colors and scents surrounded and enervated him. He could see nothing but flowers on the path of his future life. At intervals, however, a strange vision would come back to his memory, some vivid landscape of his childhood, or some dark valley in the Colonies, and he regretted these pictures of his old enthusiasms which he tried in vain to keep fresh. But why seek to bring back the past when the present had so many charms? He gazed, not without that sadness which accompanies a growing desire, at the dazzling white neck of the girl as she bent forward to get a better view of the course of her awkwardly thrown bouquet and he could not but admire the bloom of her pale skin.
Alice turned to her companion, whose silence troubled her, and one look from her blue eyes was purification to the young man’s thoughts. With her little ungloved hand she pointed to the basket which was rapidly emptying itself.
“Here are some flowers,” she cried. “Aren’t you going to throw any?”
She blushed as she uttered these simple words, and her extreme shyness made her look the lovelier.
The allegorical chariot of Summer passed on, and, following a carriage covered with vervain and roses, came the regimental break of the dragoons quartered at Chambéry, artistically decorated with brilliant sunflowers and big bunches of jonquils. Among the officers in uniform the only one standing was Lieutenant de Marthenay, whose elegance was of the rather cumbersome kind which evidences the passing of youth. He carried a bouquet of rare and lovely orchids. It was very evident that he was looking for someone on the stands. When he saw Mademoiselle Dulaurens, he smiled, bowed, and made as if he would throw the bouquet to her. This bold impertinence, drawing the public gaze upon the young girl, vexed Marcel Guibert, who dived into Alice’s basket and with a very efficacious zeal was the first to begin the fight with his rival. His aim was well-calculated, but not so the strength. He struck the Dragoon full in the face, thereby extinguishing the bright smile. De Marthenay, taken aback, let the precious orchids fall on the ground where they were picked up at once by a watchful collector of flowers.
Furious at this, he swept the stand with his glance, only to see Isabelle Orlandi, who was clapping her hands and crying:
“Well hit! Three cheers for the Tirailleurs!”
Jean Berlier backed her up, amused at her exuberant spirits. De Marthenay, however, paid no attention to their raillery. At last he noticed Marcel Guibert’s strong, contemptuous face a little behind Alice. But while his anger and malice grew stronger and stronger, the Dragoon’s chariot passed on.
At every turn which brought him in front of the Dulaurens party, he saw Alice, forgetful of the battle, talking to his rival; she seemed a changed, absorbed, and less retiring Alice. And, every time, Isabelle and her admirer took a spiteful joy in interrupting his observations by incessantly bombarding him. They had the advantage of the position, and they kept at it all the afternoon.