which then prevailed, and made the language of love so universal as almost to divest it of meaning, allowed him to try his acknowledged powers of fascination on Francesca without committing himself; who, her heart wholly occupied with the image of another,
"Smiled, and then forgot
The gentle things to which she listened not."
Not so Madame de Soissons, who at once divined his intentions and watched his progress, internally resolving to render him every ill office pique could suggest, or ridicule execute. Still, she feared him, for everything was in his favour—rank, fortune, personal advantages; but, most of all, she dreaded himself. She noted that he had read Francesca's character truly, and sought to propitiate her favour by the refined sentiment, and an undercurrent of exalted and poetic feeling, which showed to great advantage, veiled, not hidden, by his lively and graceful manner. But Francesca's sudden paleness and deep blush at the name of Evelyn threw a new light upon the subject. Marie at once recollected the young and handsome Englishman who had occupied so large a portion of their attention in Italy. She remembered vaguely some history of a quarrel, she could scarcely recollect what, between him and Francesca;
