But the amorous, imprudent youth, like a faithful echo, repeated aloud,—
"We should deplore your retirement, but would resign ourselves to bear it, Madame."
"Ah, very good!" was all Catherine said.
Then she continued in a voice of suppressed rage, pointing at Gabriel,—
"As for that villain, I shall meet with him again, sooner or later."
"I know it, Madame," replied the young man, whose mind was still dwelling on the horoscope.
But Catherine heard him not.
In a perfect fury of wrath, she included the charming young king and queen and the Duc de Guise in a baleful glance, viperish and awful,—a fatal glance, wherein one might have read the promise of all the crimes dictated by Catherine's ambition and the whole sombre history of the last kings of the Valois line.
Without another word she left the room.