She paused, and my heart sunk; but suddenly she kissed me; her eyes beamed with a beautiful expression, and taking my hands in hers, site said,—
'You would have married me when you believed me to be but a poor soubrette, dear Arthnr—you, a gentleman of family; a cuirassier of the proud Garde du Corps Ecossais; I have not forgotten that, or that to be ungenerous would be unlike the daughter of Duke Charles. A pure passion, a true love, should ever be ready to make every temporal sacrifice for the object of its regard; but this is no sacrifice that you ask me—to fly with you to your country—this Scotland of which we hear so much in song and war. I ask you to give me a protector; to save me from the Bastille, from Richelieu, and from Louis—from becoming again the wedded victim of a sinking state.'
'Heaven bless you, beloved Louise! This, then, casts the die and decides me. No man can serve two masters.'
'What mean you, Arthur?'
'I cannot obey love and Louis XIII. at the same time.'
'What will the world say, on hearing that after being but three weeks a widow I wedded again?'
'It will say that your so-called husband was but a child; that you were made the sport of circumstances and the tool of calculating politicians, who snared you into so preposterous an espousal.'
'Perhaps so,' she sobbed upon my breast; 'but my father——' 'Is a fugitive.'
'My poor father! so brave, so true, and tender! I shall never see his kind face again; but surely, to be the wife of a well-tried soldier——'
'Will be no disgrace in the eyes of Charles of Lorraine,' I added.