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 56 to be buried in a dingy old château, in the depths of a ridiculous province. You are made for the world, for the court, for pleasure, to be loved, admired, and envied. No, you don't know yourself, nor does Bergerac know you, nor his wife! I, at least, appreciate you. I know that you are supremely beautiful—"

"Vicomte," said Mlle. de Bergerac, "you forget—the child."

"Hang the child! Why did you bring him along? You are no child. You can understand me. You are a woman, full of intelligence and goodness and beauty. They don't know you here, they think you a little demoiselle in pinafores. Before Heaven, mademoiselle, there is that about you,—I see it, I feel it here at your side, in this rustling darkness—there is that about you that a man would gladly die for."

Mlle. de Bergerac interrupted him with energy. "You talk extravagantly. I don't understand you; you frighten me."

"I talk as I feel. I frighten you? So much