“Did it come from you, Monsieur le duc?” she said, holding the sparkling handle toward him.  “There was a card with it, saying, ’Guess if you can,’ and some asterisks.  Francoise and Dumay credit Butscha with this charming surprise; but my dear Butscha is not rich enough to buy such rubies.  And as for papa (to whom I said, as I remember, on Sunday evening, that I had no whip), he sent to Rouen for this one,” —­pointing to a whip in her father’s hand, with a top like a cone of turquoise, a fashion then in vogue which has since become vulgar.

“I would give ten years of my old age, mademoiselle, to have the right to offer you that beautiful jewel,” said the duke, courteously.

“Ah, here comes the audacious giver!” cried Modeste, as Canalis rode up.  “It is only a poet who knows where to find such choice things.  Monsieur,” she said to Melchior, “my father will scold you, and say that you justify those who accuse you of extravagance.”

“Oh!” exclaimed Canalis, with apparent simplicity, “so that is why La Briere rode at full gallop from Havre to Paris?”

“Does your secretary take such liberties?” said Modeste, turning pale, and throwing the whip to Francoise with an impetuosity that expressed scorn.  “Give me your whip, papa.”

“Poor Ernest, who lies there on his bed half-dead with fatigue!” said Canalis, overtaking the girl, who had already started at a gallop.  “You are pitiless, mademoiselle.  ‘I have’ (the poor fellow said to me) ‘only this one chance to remain in her memory.’”

“And should you think well of a woman who could take presents from half the parish?” said Modeste.

She was surprised to receive no answer to this inquiry, and attributed the poet’s inattention to the noise of the horse’s feet.

“How you delight in tormenting those who love you,” said the duke.  “Your nobility of soul and your pride are so inconsistent with your faults that I begin to suspect you calumniate yourself, and do those naughty things on purpose.”

“Ah! have you only just found that out, Monsieur le duc?” she exclaimed, laughing.  “You have the sagacity of a husband.”

They rode half a mile in silence.  Modeste was a good deal astonished not to receive the fire of the poet’s eyes.  The evening before, as she was pointing out to him an admirable effect of setting sunlight across the water, she had said, remarking his inattention, “Well, don’t you see it?”—­to which he replied, “I can see only your hand”; but now his admiration for the beauties of nature seemed a little too intense to be natural.

“Does Monsieur de La Briere know how to ride?” she asked, for the purpose of teasing him.

“Not very well, but he gets along,” answered the poet, cold as Gobenheim before the colonel’s return.

At a cross-road, which Monsieur Mignon made them take through a lovely valley to reach a height overlooking the Seine, Canalis let Modeste and the duke pass him, and then reined up to join the colonel.