"Fool!" was the contemptuous answer, more coldly delivered now, for
the Marquis was getting himself in hand. "If you come near Bellecour
again, if you are so much as found within the grounds of the park,
I'll have you beaten to death by my grooms for your presumption.
Keep you the memory of that promise in mind, Sir Secretary, and let
it warn you to avoid Bellecour, as you would a plague-house. Come,
Suzanne," he said, turning abruptly to his daughter, "Enough of
this delightful morning have we already wasted on this canaille."

With that he offered her his wrist, and so, without so much as
another glance at La Boulaye, she took her departure.

The secretary remained where they had left him, pale of face -
saving the fortuitous crimson mark which the whip had cut - and
very sick at heart. The heat of the moment being spent, he had
leisure to contemplate his plight. A scorned lover, a beaten man,
a dismissed secretary! He looked sorrowfully upon his volume of
"The Discourses," and for the first time a doubt crossed his mind
touching the wisdom of old Jean Jacques. Was there would there ever
be any remedy for such a condition of things as now prevailed?

Already the trees had hidden the Marquis and his daughter from La
Boulaye's sight. The young revolutionist felt weary and lonely -
dear God, how lonely! neither kith nor kin had he, and of late all
the interest of his life - saving always that absorbed by Jean
Jacques - had lain in watching Suzanne de Bellecour, and in loving
her silently and distantly. Now that little crumb of comfort was
to be his no more, he was to go away from Bellecour, away from the
sight of her for all time. And he loved her, loved her, loved her!