The Argosy — page 391: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Apel 88. Aunt Felicité. 369 ‘‘T have not the honour of knowing your mistress,” he said to Elodie. ‘‘ Mademoiselle and I are neighbours, and have only seen each other by chance.” He paused ; Geneviéve had raised her eyes ; she looked timid again, but no longer angry. He went on, “ If she will permit | me, I shall be proud to offer her your sweet flowers.” She took the nosegay very unwillingly, he thought, and she looked inclined to give it back, when the old woman said : ‘‘Don’t tell the aunt anybody gave them to thee; they grew in Elodie’s garden, that is all Mon beau monsieur,” she went on, warned by a frown on Geneviéve’s gentle face, “you must take your- self off: my child and I have words to speak which are not for you.” Seton looked at Geneviéve, but she gave him no encouragement to remain. He pocketed his sketch-book as leisurely as possible, and with a bow, first to the mistress and then to the old servant, he lounged up the hilly street that leads to the ruined Norman bastions of what was once the Castle of St. Roque. It was very hot, and he was tired, but he did not stop till he reached the closely cropped grass on the ramparts. Then he flung himself down, startling a flock of tortoiseshell butterflies only just hatched, who had been settling on the clover blossoms on which he now rested. Seton looked lazily after the insects, as they flew here and there, attracted first by one blossom, then by another; an incessant flutter of brown and blue and gold. “Upon my soul, I am not much better than a butterfly. I came to this place for two days at the outside, and I’ve been here ten. Why don’t I go? Ah! there it is. If I go now, I’m afraid I shall leave something belonging to me which I can’t very well spare. Con- found it! why amI such a soft-hearted fool? Can't I listen to a sweet voice and look at a sweet face, but I must straightway want it for my own? Yes, that is what Ido want. Geneviéve—I never knew her name before—it suits her exactly. I want to have those eyes of hers looking into mine, and to hear that voice of hers telling me she loves me, and that she never could love anybody else. Whata voice it is!” In England, Mr. Seton was a welcome guest in what is called “ society ;” he had kept heart-whole there; but now he had fallen a victim to this disease of love, because his ears had listened to the singing of the loveliest voice he had ever heard, and twice each day he had seen the singer's charming face for a few minutes at the window opposite his room at the Hotel de Paris. He knew nothing else about her. He had found out the house at the back window of which he had seen her, but there was nothing to be learnt there. He had knocked, and asked who lived in the particular hotfse that interested him, but the door was opened by a child, who seemed unable to understand his rather British French. “ Maman est sortie,” was all the answer he comicloooks (CO) mn _