Mademoiselle de Verneuil plucked out her dagger, and showed it to the frightened girl, who dropped on a chair and clasped her hands.
"What have you come here for, Marie?" she cried in a supplicating voice which asked no answer.
Mademoiselle de Verneuil was busily twisting the branches of holly which she had gathered.
"I don't know whether this holly will be becoming," she said; "a brilliant skin like mine may possibly bear a dark wreath of this kind.
What do you think, Francine?"
Several remarks of the same kind as she dressed for the ball showed the absolute self-possession and coolness of this strange woman.
Whoever had listened to her then would have found it hard to believe in the gravity of a situation in which she was risking her life.An Indian muslin gown, rather short and clinging like damp linen, revealed the delicate outlines of her shape; over this she wore a red drapery, numerous folds of which, gradually lengthening as they fell by her side, took the graceful curves of a Greek peplum.This voluptuous garment of the pagan priestesses lessened the indecency of the rest of the attire which the fashions of the time suffered women to wear.To soften its immodesty still further, Marie threw a gauze scarf over her shoulders, left bare and far too low by the red drapery.She wound the long braids of her hair into the flat irregular cone above the nape of the neck which gives such grace to certain antique statues by an artistic elongation of the head, while a few stray locks escaping from her forehead fell in shining curls beside her cheeks.With a form and head thus dressed, she presented a perfect likeness of the noble masterpieces of Greek sculpture.She smiled as she looked with approval at the arrangement of her hair, which brought out the beauties of her face, while the scarlet berries of the holly wreath which she laid upon it repeated charmingly the color of the peplum.As she twisted and turned a few leaves, to give capricious diversity to their arrangement, she examined her whole costume in a mirror to judge of its general effect.
"I am horrible to-night," she said, as though she were surrounded by flatterers."I look like a statue of Liberty."She placed the dagger carefully in her bosom leaving the rubies in the hilt exposed, their ruddy reflections attracting the eye to the hidden beauties of her shape.Francine could not bring herself to leave her mistress.When Marie was ready she made various pretexts to follow her.She must help her to take off her mantle, and the overshoes which the mud and muck in the streets compelled her to wear (though the roads had been sanded for this occasion); also the gauze veil which Mademoiselle de Verneuil had thrown over her head to conceal her features from the Chouans who were collecting in the streets to watch the company.The crowd was in fact so great that they were forced to make their way through two hedges of Chouans.Francine no longer strove to detain her mistress, and after giving a few last touches to a costume the greatest charm of which was its exquisite freshness, she stationed herself in the courtyard that she might not abandon this beloved mistress to her fate without being able to fly to her succor;for the poor girl foresaw only evil in these events.
A strange scene was taking place in Montauran's chamber as Marie was on her way to the ball.The young marquis, who had just finished dressing, was putting on the broad red ribbon which distinguished him as first in rank of the assembly, when the Abbe Gudin entered the room with an anxious air.
"Monsieur le marquis, come quickly," he said."You alone can quell a tumult which has broken out, I don't know why, among the leaders.They talk of abandoning the king's cause.I think that devil of a Rifoel is at the bottom of it.Such quarrels are always caused by some mere nonsense.Madame du Gua reproached him, so I hear, for coming to the ball ill-dressed.""That woman must be crazy," cried the marquis, "to try to--""Rifoel retorted," continued the abbe, interrupting his chief, "that if you had given him the money promised him in the king's name--""Enough, enough; I understand it all now.This scene has all been arranged, and you are put forward as ambassador--""I, monsieur le marquis!" said the abbe, again interrupting him."I am supporting you vigorously, and you will, I hope, do me the justice to believe that the restoration of our altars in France and that of the king upon the throne of his fathers are far more powerful incentives to my humble labors than the bishopric of Rennes which you--"The abbe dared say no more, for the marquis smiled bitterly at his last words.However, the young chief instantly repressed all expression of feeling, his brow grew stern, and he followed the Abbe Gudin into a hall where the worst of the clamor was echoing.
"I recognize no authority here," Rifoel was saying, casting angry looks at all about him and laying his hand on the hilt of his sabre.
"Do you recognize that of common-sense?" asked the marquis, coldly.
The young Chevalier de Vissard, better known under his patronymic of Rifoel, was silent before the general of the Catholic armies.
"What is all this about, gentlemen?" asked the marquis, examining the faces round him.
"This, monsieur le marquis," said a famous smuggler, with the awkwardness of a man of the people who long remains under the yoke of respect to a great lord, though he admits no barriers after he has once jumped them, and regards the aristocrat as an equal only, "/this/," he said, "and you have come in the nick of time to hear it.