Belle Rose: A Romance of the Cloak and Sword — page 241: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A PROPOSAL OF MARRIAGE. 225 ‘‘Well! madame, it is Monsieur de Louvois’ will that you marry me.’”’ Madame d’Albergotti grew red as a strawberry and ut- tered a slight cry. ‘““Yes, madame, that you marry me!’’ repeated the count, bowing. ‘‘But it is a piece of folly!’’ exclaimed Suzanne. ‘For you, madame, I am of that opinion; but permit me to believe that it is nothing of the kind on my side.’’ ‘Ig it quite seriously that Monsieur de Louvois has spoken to you, monsieur?”’ ‘lhe most seriously in the world.”’ ‘‘He wishes me to be your wife?’’ ‘Or me to be your husband, whichever you prefer.’’ ‘‘And that is the only condition which he has attached to my liberty?”’ ‘The only one.’’ ‘‘Pardon me, monsieur, if I insist,’’ said Suzanne, ‘‘but will you inform meif this proposition comes from Mon- sieur de Louvois himself.”’ ‘Certainly, madame, it is an audacity which I would have never had.”’ ‘It appears at least that you approve of it.’’ ‘‘T humbly acknowledge it. When the door of paradise is open to you, one does not close it.”’ ‘‘This is the language of the court, and you forget that I am almost in prison.’’ ‘*Let me believe that you will never be there.”’ ‘*IT see, monsieur,’’ replied Suzanne, gravely, ‘‘that your cousin, Monsieur de Louvois, has not told you every- thing. “On the contrary, madame, he has told me everything,”’ said Monsieur de Pomereux, with a smile. Suzanne looked at him with frightened eyes. ‘‘He has told you that I was affianced to him whose flight I have protected?” exclaimed she. ‘Yes, madame.”’ “That I loved him?” 6¢ Yes. 99 ‘That he loved me?”’ **Yes.’ cee 2 you have consented to marry me?’’ .** Yes “Oh! you lie!’’ exclaimed Suzanne, rising with a face purple with indignation. **Not at all; it seems to me that I say to you the most CORMCE OO) 3