All the assembly remarked his gaiety and his good humour. On the
following day only it was learned, that, during the hunt, he had fallen
from his horse, and had sat at his majesty's card table with a broken
rib. Nobody made any remark, so perfectly natural did this act of
ordinary politeness appear in those days. This little Daburon, if he is
unwell, would have given proof of his breeding by saying nothing about
it, and remaining for my piquet. But he is as well as I am. Who can tell
what games he has gone to play elsewhere!"
CHAPTER VII.
M. Daburon did not return home on leaving Mademoiselle d'Arlange. All
through the night he wandered about at random, seeking to cool his
heated brow, and to allay his excessive weariness.
"Fool that I was!" said he to himself, "thousand times fool to have
hoped, to have believed, that she would ever love me. Madman! how
could I have dared to dream of possessing so much grace, nobleness, and
beauty! How charming she was this evening, when her face was bathed in
tears! Could anything be more angelic? What a sublime expression her
eyes had in speaking of him! How she must love him! And I? She loves me
as a father, she told me so,--as a father! And could it be otherwise?
Is it not justice? Could she see a lover in a sombre and severe-looking
magistrate, always as sad as his black coat? Was it not a crime to dream
of uniting that virginal simplicity to my detestable knowledge of the
world? For her, the future is yet the land of smiling chimeras; and long
since experience has dissipated all my illusions.
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