on his escutcheon?  He thought with a certain fretful impatience of Sylvie, of her captivating grace, her tender eyes, her sweet laughter, and sweeter smile.  She had seemed to him a mere slight creation of the air and the moonbeams,—­something dainty that would have melted at a touch, and dropped into his mouth, as it were, like a French bon-bon.  So he, man-like, had judged, and now lo!—­the little ethereal creature had suddenly displayed a soul of adamant—­hard and pure, and glittering as a diamond,—­which no persuasion could break or bend.  She had actually kept her word!—­she had most certainly left Paris.  The Marquis knew that, by the lamentable story of her dismissed maid who had come to him with hysterical tears, declaring that “Madame” had suddenly developed a “humeur incroyable”—­and had gone away alone,—­alone, save for a little dusky-skinned Arab boy whom she had once brought away from Biskra and had trained as an attendant,—­her “gouvernante” and companion, Madame Bozier, and her old butler who had known her from childhood.  Fontenelle felt that the dismissal of the maid who had been such a convenient spy for him, was due to Angela Sovrani’s interference, and though angry, he was conscious of feeling at the same time mean in himself, and miserable.  To employ a servant to play the spy on her mistress, and report to him her actions and movements, might be worthy of a Miraudin, but was it quite the thing for a Marquis Fontenelle?  Thinking over these things his handsome face grew flushed and anon pale again, as from time to time he stole a vexed side glance at the easy Miraudin,—­so like him in features and—­unfortunately so equally like him in morals!  Meanwhile, the music of the Mass surged round him, in thunders of the organ, wailings of violins, groaning of ‘cellos, and flutings of boys’ and men’s voices,—­and as the cloudy incense rose upon the air he began to weave strange fancies in his mind, and to see in the beams of sunlight falling through the stained glass windows a vision of the bright face of Sylvie looking down upon him with a half-tender, half-reproving smile,—­a smile that seemed to say, “If thou lovest me, set the grace of honour on thy love!” These were strange thoughts for him to entertain, and he was almost ashamed of them,—­but as long as the melodies of the Mass kept rolling on and reverberating around him he could not help thinking of them; so that he was relieved when a pause came,—­the interval for the sermon,—­and Abbe Vergniaud, leisurely mounting the steps of the pulpit, stood surveying the congregation with the composed yet quizzical air for which he was celebrated, and waiting till the rustling, fidgeting, coughing, snuffing, toe-scraping noises of the congregation had settled down into comparative silence.  His attitude during this interval was suggestive.  It implied contempt, wearied patience, resignation, and a curious touch of defiance.  Holding himself very erect he rested his left hand on the elaborate sculptured edge of the pulpit,—­it