“What do I care for his soldiership?  He has put off our wedding.  For how many years did you say?”

“No; he has put it on.”

In answer to the astonished looks this excited, he explained that the wedding was to have been in a week, but now it must be to-morrow at ten o’clock.

The three ladies set up their throats together.  “Tomorrow?”

“To-morrow.  Why, what do you suppose I left Paris for yesterday? left my duties even.”

“What, monsieur?” asked Josephine, timidly, “did you ride all that way, and leave your duties merely to marry me?” and she looked a little pleased.

“You are worth a great deal more trouble than that,” said Raynal simply.  “Besides, I had passed my word, and I always keep my word.”

“So do I,” said Josephine, a little proudly.  “I will not go from it now, if you insist; but I confess to you, that such a proposal staggers me; so sudden—­no preliminaries—­no time to reflect; in short, there are so many difficulties that I must request you to reconsider the matter.”

“Difficulties,” shouted Raynal with merry disdain; “there are none, unless you sit down and make them; we do more difficult things than this every day of our lives:  we passed the bridge of Arcola in thirteen minutes; and we had not the consent of the enemy, as we have yours—­have we not?”

Her only reply was a look at her mother, to which the baroness replied by a nod; then turning to Raynal, “This empressement is very flattering; but I see no possibility:  there is an etiquette we cannot altogether defy:  there are preliminaries before a daughter of Beaurepaire can become a wife.”

“There used to be all that, madam,” laughed Raynal, putting her down good-humoredly; “but it was in the days when armies came out and touched their caps to one another, and went back into winter quarters.  Then the struggle was who could go slowest; now the fight is who can go fastest.  Time and Bonaparte wait for nobody; and ladies and other strong places are taken by storm, not undermined a foot a month as under Noah Quartorze:  let me cut this short, as time is short.”

He then drew a little plan of a wedding campaign.  “The carriages will be here at 9 A.M.,” said he; “they will whisk us down to the mayor’s house by a quarter to ten:  Picard, the notary, meets us there with the marriage contract, to save time; the contract signed, the mayor will do the marriage at quick step out of respect for me—­half an hour—­quarter past ten; breakfast in the same house an hour and a quarter:—­we mustn’t hurry a wedding breakfast—­then ten minutes or so for the old fogies to waste in making speeches about our virtues—­my watch will come out—­my charger will come round—­I rise from the table—­embrace my dear old mother—­kiss my wife’s hand—­into the saddle—­canter to Paris—­roll to Toulon—­sail to Egypt.  But I shall leave a wife and a mother behind me:  they will