As we were returning to the chateau, we heard a great noise of voices and laughter, and we saw at the foot of the stoop some ten or twelve young men who were jumping and bounding, as if trying to reach, without the help of the steps, the platform that crowns the double staircase.  We were enabled to understand the explanation of these passionate gymnastics as soon as the light of the moon enabled us to distinguish a white dress on the platform.  It was evidently a tournament of which the white dress was to crown the victor.  The young lady (had she not been young, they would not have jumped so high) was leaning over the balustrade, exposing boldly to the dew of an autumn night, and to the kisses of Diana, her flower-wreathed head and her bare shoulders; she was slightly stooping down, and held out to the competitors an object somewhat difficult to discern at a distance; it was a slender cigarette, the delicate handiwork of her white fingers and her rosy nails.  Although there was nothing in the sight that was not charming, Monsieur de Malouet probably found in it something he did not like, for his tone of cheerful good-humor became suddenly shaded with a perceptible tint of annoyance, when he murmured: 

“There it is again!  I was sure of it!  It is the Little Countess!”

It is hardly necessary for me to add that I had recognized, in the Little Countess, my Amazon with the blue plume, who, with or without plume, seems to have always the same disposition.  She recognized me perfectly also, on her side, as you’ll see directly.  At the moment when we were reaching, Monsieur Malouet and myself, the top of the stoop, leaving the rival pretenders to vie and struggle with increasing ardor, the little countess, intimidated perhaps by the presence of the marquis, resolved to put an end to the scene, and thrust abruptly her cigarette into my hand, saying: 

“Here! it’s for you!  After all, you jump better than any of them.”

And she disappeared after this parting shaft, which possessed the double advantage of hitting at once both the victor and the vanquished.

This was, so far as I am concerned, the last noticeable episode of the evening.  After a game or two of whist, I pretended a little fatigue, and Monsieur de Malouet had the kindness to escort me in person to a pretty little room, hung with chintz and contiguous to the library.  I was disturbed during part of the night by the monotonous sound of the piano and the rumbling noise of the carriages, indications of civilization which made me regret more bitterly than ever my poor Thebais.

CHAPTER V.

A DENUNCIATION OVERHEARD.

28th September.