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"This Rafaella, then, was the Count's daughter?" "His only child, a girl lovely and gracious beyond rivalry." "Oh, of course, beyond rivalry. Are not all only daughters lovely and perfect when once they are dead?" she replied with a bitter smile. "They have their legend, their cult, and usually a flattering portrait. I am surprised that Rafaella's is not here.
The latter seized it, and rising joyously, laid his hand on the shoulder of the smith, who was still kneeling on the count's breast, and said beseechingly: "Let that suffice. The man is only. . . ." He went no farther a gurgling, piercing cry of pain escaped his lips, and pressing one hand to his breast, and the other to his brow, he sank on the snow beside the stump of a giant pine.
At my impressionable age, with my impressionable habit, I took kindly to all this; I discussed love with Donna Giulia, and puzzled her sadly; I expressed my feelings upon religion to the Abbe Loisic, the count's bookbinder, and bored him to extinction. One day I was presented to a tall cadaverous gentleman with red eyelashes and eyes so pale as to seem almost white.
"Did he mention his business?" I asked. "Count Fosco said he had come here, sir, because Miss Halcombe was unable to leave Blackwater Park." Fresh troubles, apparently. Not exactly his own, as I had supposed, but dear Marian's. Troubles, anyway. Oh dear! "Show him in," I said resignedly. The Count's first appearance really startled me. He was such an alarmingly large person that I quite trembled.
Despite the shrill demands of Duchess Margaret, therefore; the Prince did not take very active measures by which the crown of Philip might be secured. He, perhaps, looked upon the struggle almost with indifference. Nevertheless, he issued a formal proclamation by which the Count's enlistments were forbidden.
When the carriage stopped at the Castle, the servants and officers belonging to the Count's household were waiting to receive them. Mary had a warm welcome from them all. Every one showed the greatest joy at seeing her again, and their congratulations on her innocence having been proved were manifestly sincere.
But Saint-Germain insisted, and Madame de Pompadour, thinking that the cross might be worth forty louis, made a sign to Madame du Hausset that she should accept. She did, and the jewel was valued at 1,500 francs which hardly proves that the other large jewels were genuine, though Von Gleichen believed that they were, and thought the Count's cabinet of old masters very valuable.
"Adieu, count," said the chevalier, without seeming in any way to have noticed the count's slight; "adieu, and bring us back a princess who will not talk with her own portrait too much." "Yes, set off and lose no time. By the by, who accompany you?" "Bragelonne and De Wardes." "Both excellent and fearless companions." "Too fearless," said the chevalier; "endeavor to bring them both back, count."
The lad was obliged to be still, having broken his foot in a fall from his horse, and as Ulrich was of the same size and age, the artist wished him to put on the young count's clothes and serve as a model. The smith's son now received the best clothes belonging to his aristocratic companion in age.
The Bastard's lance shivered fairly against the small shield of the Englishman; but the Woodville's weapon, more deftly aimed, struck full on the count's bassinet, and at the same time the pike projecting from the gray charger's chaffron pierced the nostrils of the unhappy bay, which rage and shame had blinded more than ever.
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