She stood looking at him without replying; her mouth was tightly shut in a hard line that pressed inward all its soft and rosy prettiness. She was seeing how haggard his face was, how heavy his eyes, how full of fatigue his movements. Her silence recalled him to the memory of the past day.
“Forgive me, my dear child, if I have seemed without sympathy in all your honors,” he said gently, as he laid his hand on her shoulder. “Believe me, it was unintentional. No one knows better than I how richly you deserved them; no one rejoices more that you should have received them.”
The very gentleness of the apology stung her like a scorpion; she shook herself roughly out of his hold.
“Point de phrases! All the army is at my back; do you think I cannot do without you? Sympathy too! Bah! We don't know those fine words in camp. You are wanted, I tell you—go!”
“But where?”
“To your Silver Pheasant yonder—go!”
“Who? I do not—”
“Dame! Can you not understand? Milady wants to see you; I told her I would send you to her. You can use your dainty sentences with her; she is of your Order!”
“What! she wishes—”
“Go!” reiterated the Little One with a stamp of her boot. “You know the great tent where she is throned in honor—Morbleu!—as if the oldest and ugliest hag that washes out my soldiers' linen were not of more use and more deserved such lodgment than Mme. la Princesse, who has never done aught in her life, not even brushed out her own hair of gold! She waits for you. Where are your palace manners? Go to her, I tell you. She is of your own people; we are not!”