"Oh! I am so glad that you could come to-day," said the countess, resuming her wonted gayety. "Do you share my wish for a stroll in the park this afternoon, whilst the band is playing?"
"I always share your wishes, dear countess, and am too happy when I may share your pleasures."
"That is almost a compliment, I should say, and you think yourself incapable of paying one. Why do you never pay compliments?"
"I will tell you, if you will, in return, tell me why the portrait of Monsieur Armand is always so near your favorite seat."
"The reason is, I suppose," said the countess, laughing, "that I am so used to it, that I am quite unconscious whether it is there or not."
"Then I will tell you why I rarely pay you compliments,--because I like you too well."
"So you can only compliment those whom you dislike?"
"On the contrary, those to whom I am indifferent."
"But Colonel de Villefort," exclaimed the countess, gravely tying on her white bonnet before the mirror and observing, with satisfaction, that the soft white lace brought out the lustre of her rich hair and her clear gray eyes, "do you know that public opinion decides that you will never marry?"
"Public opinion, perhaps, is wise enough to decide, because I never have married, that I never shall," replied De Villefort, offering his arm to the countess as they passed through the door.
"There is certainly a reason for such a supposition in your case,--for you have had inducements to marry." The colonel was grave and thoughtful, and, for a few moments, they walked on in silence until the sound of music roused him from a revery which Mathilde cared not to disturb. "We are in the park now," he said, at last, "and almost in the midst of 'public opinion,'" he added laughing; "but, after the music, if you are not too tired for a stroll in the Jardin du Roi, I will tell you some incidents of my early life, and you shall judge whether I can marry."
"Oh! thank you," said the countess, eagerly and gratefully, more with her eyes than her voice, for the latter was quite lost in a blast of Roland à Roncevaux from the trumpets of one of the imperial bands. The afternoon being warm, the band was ranged in a circle under the protecting shade of the great, careless old trees; but the sun's rays penetrated here and there through their branches, throwing a golden light on the curls of rosy children frolicking on the green grass, casting an aureole of glory around the heads of gray-haired old men, and glittering in the epaulets of flighty young officers. There were knots of people grouped about in every direction,--French girls, by the side of their chaperons, immersed in needle-work; imperious English misses staring haughtily at the officers; ladies of opulent financial circles, in striking toilets of the last mode, fresh from Paris, and a few relics of the "_Ancienne Noblesse_," plainly attired, and looking curiously and, perhaps, disdainfully from their small exclusive _coterie_, at all this bourgeois splendor. Old women with weather-beaten, parchment faces, under neat frilled caps, were possibly retrieving, in their old age, the errors of a stormy youth, by carrying on the "_Service des chaises_." Others were plying a brisk trade among the children by the sale of cakes, plaisirs, and parlor balloons.