"Ah treacherous!" exclaimed the girl, striking him playfully with her hand, and skipping away.
"Peste!" said the captain, twirling his moustache; "but your little fingers smart, my pretty one."
"Now for the other story, Monsieur St. Florian," said I, when the bright wine sparkled in the tall glasses, and our fair attendant had withdrawn. "I would fain learn why an old soldier dislikes any sort of wine. I have often drank ditch-water on the line of march, and have gladly filled my canteen from the ruts of the artillery wheels——"
"And so have I a thousand times, but my dislike to mulled port arises from something more than mere prejudice—bah! this is worth an ocean of a muddy drench, boiled in a kettle with sugar and cloves. See how it sparkles when the glass is raised to the light. Ma foi! 't is like a glass full of diamonds. We shall drink to the emperor."
"I have no objection."
"I hope the door is closed, though. Paris is such a city for espionage, police, and informers: Ouf! but 'Vive l'Empereur Napoleon!'" and he drained his long glass, while his dark eyes flashed with enthusiasm.
"Long life to him!" said I, with a frankness that won the Frenchman's heart; "and now let me know the cause of this horror of mulled wine."
"Perhaps you have already heard it. I well remember that it made a deuced noise at the time it occurred, and, save the maid of Zaragossa, there never was a woman so extolled by the Spaniards as she of whom I am about to speak,—
"THE WIDOW OF MADRID;"
for so he named the following story.