The Marquis got gloomier and gloomier as time went on.  I could not look up that I did not find his angry eyes fixed on me.  Even Victorine’s aggressive joy at having caught him was damped when she could not get him to pay attention to what she was saying.  At last when he was straining his ears to try and hear my conversation with the Vicomte, she got absolutely exasperated with him, and addressed a question to him in a loud, sharp voice.  It made him jump so that he bounced round in his seat; and as she had lowered her head to put the piece of becassine—­which had been poised on her fork while she spoke—­into her mouth, his jumping round, and her raising her head suddenly, made her daisies catch on his beard; and you never saw such a funny sight, Mamma!  It was a nasty little wired dewdrop that got fixed in poor Monsieur de Beaupre’s fur, and there they were:  she still grasping her fork and he looking ready to eat her with annoyance.  Their two heads were fastened together, and there they would have remained, only Hippolyte (who always goes everywhere with the Baronne) came to the rescue, and untangled them.  But it hurt the Marquis very much, as some of the hairs had to be pulled out, and it did not mend matters Hippolyte muttering, “Cela doit etre que Monsieur le Marquis doit faire plus attention a l’affaire qu’il a en main, s’il desire garder ses cheveux intacts.”

[Sidenote:  The Vicomte’s Proposal]

The affair made quite a commotion at the table, and Victorine so nearly cried with rage that the Marquis’s mother had to give her smelling salts.  Mme. de Vermandoise was overcome with laughter, and her tongue was hardly ever out of her gap, while the Marquis sat, white with fury.

When we left the table, arm-in-arm, things cleared up, and, while we were alone when the men went back to smoke, Victorine was made to “play something,” and she really plays very well.  It was so stiflingly hot that at last some one—­the Comtesse, I believe—­asked to have the windows opened on to the terrace.  There was a fair-sized moon, and we all went out there, even Godmamma for a few moments.  The men came out of the smoking-room windows and joined us, and for the first time since I have been in France we talked to the persons we wanted to, without either shouting across some one else or making a general conversation.

“Antoine” and Heloise leant over the balustrade; the Comte and the Marquise stayed by the window, while the Vicomte whispered to me by the steps; and Victorine and her Marquis stood like two wax figures, not saying a word, by the orange trees.  I don’t know whether it was owing to the moon or not, but the Vicomte did say such a lot of charming things to me.  He said he loved me, and would I marry him; he would arrange it all, as fortunately he has no parents to consult.