"Natalie is a good girl," said her father; but he was thinking of other
things.

"Beautiful?"

"Some would say so."

"But not like the English young ladies?"

"Not at all."

"I thought not. I remember the black-eyed little one--with her pride in
Batthyany, and her hatred in Gorgey, and all the rest of it. The little
Empress!--with her proud eyes, and her black eyelashes. Do you remember
at Dunkirk, when old Anton Pepczinski met her for the first time?
'_Little Natalushka, if I wait for you, will you marry me when you grow
up?_" Then the quick answer, "_I am not to be called any longer by my
nursery name; but if you will fight for my country, I will marry you
when I grow up._'"

Light-hearted as this man Calabressa was, having escaped from prison,
and eagerly inclined for chatter, after so long a spell of enforced
silence, he could not fail to perceive that his companion was hardly
listening to him.

"Mais, mon frere, a quoi bon le regarder?" he said, peevishly. "If it
must come, it will come. Or is it the poor cardinal you pity? That was a
good name they invented for him, anyway--_il cardinale affamatore_."