She ran across the sunny grass to meet a man of middle age, dressed in the fashion of the Revolution.
“M. de Vauvenargues is sad to-day,” she whispered. “I tried to comfort him, but he is so very, very old. And I have heard from Paris.” She blushed defiantly.
“What do they say in Paris?” asked the Marquis de Fortia.
“They say General Bonaparte is going to marry Madame de Beauharnais. But she is not young, and he is quite well thought of, is he not?”
“I will relieve you of your post,” smiled her father. “Go and read your gossip, child.”
She laughed, and ran away into the rose garden with her hands at her bosom.
M. de Fortia went to the old man, who was staring before him at the water that dripped by the river deity into the basin of the fountain from the mouth of the urn. He looked up as his friend approached, and said abruptly, in his high voice—
“Do you think Voltaire, a great man?”
“Certainly—one of the greatest.”
“He thought my brother had genius.”