Page:Famous stories from foreign countries.djvu/28

 eyes laughed, but she said: “What foolish things you think of. You haven’t any taste, my Friend.”

Again the gentle rythm of the dance brought them together; their hands met. “You might have been my lover, down there, in the country—in La Réole, where the cow-bells preach of nature. I always had my season of return to nature.”

And she bent back and stepped away from him with coquettish grace, while the heart of poor Primus raged with flames, as if the great, destructive Revolution were confined within his own body. Again she danced back. “But to become Madame Thaller—my dear, good, honest Friend from Appenzell! What are you thinking of? One could, of course, kiss you—just for fun! Ah!—it is too bad we could not have played our comedy in La Réole. A stupid shame! Now we must renounce the kiss! unless you are willing to put up with kissing my hand?”

They had reached the place in the minuet, where—upon the stage—Zerlina destroys the sweet frivolity. And, although the gallant gentlemen, Miradoux, Vicomte Chantigny, Avenarius and Abbé Merivoli changed the music for a brief uninterrupted return to a merry da capo, Fate ordered the original setting. The door was thrown open and a harsh saloon keeper’s voice tore in shreds the flowery chains that bound their dream.

“You—there—citizens and citizenesses! Peace—in the name of the Republic!”

The dancers knew what this interruption meant. It was the daily reading of the names of those sum-