Oh yes, I know what I know!" she repeated. And she fell again to
laughing immoderately; while the pretty piece of mischief beside her hung
her head, and, putting a finger in her mouth, mocked him with an
affectation of modesty.

The young man glowered at them between rage and embarrassment. This was
not the reception, nor this the hero's return to which he had looked
forward. And a doubt began to take form in his mind. The mistress he
had pictured would not laugh at kisses given to another; nor forget in a
twinkling the straits through which he had come to her, the hell from
which he had plucked himself! Possibly the court ladies held love as
cheap as this, and lovers but as playthings, butts for their wit, and
pegs on which to hang their laughter. But--but he began to doubt, and,
perplexed and irritated, he showed his feelings.

"Madame," he said stiffly, "a jest is an excellent thing. But pardon me
if I say that it is ill played on a fasting man."

Madame desisted from laughter that she might speak. "A fasting man?" she
cried. "And he has eaten two partridges!"

"Fasting from love, Madame."

Madame St. Lo held up her hands. "And it's not two minutes since he took
a kiss!"

He winced, was silent a moment, and then seeing that he got nothing by
the tone he had adopted he cried for quarter.