Beatrix had taken the third of a box at the Opera, obscurely situated on the lower tier for the purpose of not being much in sight.  For the last few days Calyste, grown bolder, had escorted the marquise to her box, placing himself behind her, and timing their arrival at a late hour so as to meet no one in the corridors.  Beatrix, on these occasions, left the box alone before the end of the last act, and Calyste followed at a distance to watch over her, although old Antoine was always there to attend his mistress.  Maxime and La Palferine had studied this strategy, which was prompted by respect for the proprieties, also by that desire for concealment which characterizes the idolators of the little god, and also, again, by the fear which oppresses all women who have been constellations in the world and whom love has caused to fall from their zodiacal eminence.  Public humiliation is dreaded as an agony more cruel than death itself.  But, by a manoeuvre of Maxime’s, that blow to her pride, that outrage which women secure of their rank in Olympus cast upon others who have fallen from their midst, was now to descend on Beatrix.

At a performance of “Lucia,” which ends, as every one knows, with one of the finest triumphs of Rubini, Madame de Rochefide, whom Antoine had not yet come to fetch, reached the peristyle of the opera-house by the lower corridor just as the staircase was crowded by fashionable women ranged on the stairs or standing in groups below it, awaiting the announcement of their carriages.  Beatrix was instantly recognized; whispers which soon became a murmur arose in every group.  In a moment the crowd dispersed; the marquise was left alone like a leper.  Calyste dared not, seeing his wife on the staircase, advance to accompany her, though twice she vainly cast him a tearful glance, a prayer, that he would come to her.  At that moment, La Palferine, elegant, superb, charming, left two ladies with whom he had been talking, and came down to the marquise.

“Take my arm,” he said, bowing, “and walk proudly out.  I will find your carriage.”

“Will you come home with me and finish the evening?” she answered, getting into her carriage and making room for him.

La Palferine said to his groom, “Follow the carriage of madame,” and then he jumped into it beside her to the utter stupefaction of Calyste, who stood for a moment planted on his two legs as if they were lead.  It was the sight of him standing thus, pale and livid, that caused Beatrix to make the sign to La Palferine to enter her carriage.  Doves can be Robespierres in spite of their white wings.  Three carriages reached the rue de Chartres with thundering rapidity,—­that of Calyste, that of the marquise, and that of La Palferine.

“Oh! you here?” said Beatrix, entering her salon on the arm of the young count, and finding Calyste, whose horse had outstripped those of the other carriages.

“Then you know monsieur?” said Calyste, furiously.