第56章 BEFORE THE MARRIAGE.(6)

He had dropped from the divan upon his knee, and looked up to her with supplicating and anxious eyes. But Margaret did not turn her face away from him. A heavenly smile played over her features, her eye beamed with love and emotion. And as her glance sank deep into the heart of her lover, he caught the look as if it had been a ray of sunlight. She laid her arms upon his shoulders, and pressing his head to her bosom, she bowed over him and kissed his black, curly hair.

"Ah! I love you, Louis," she whispered. "I am ready to devote my life to you, to share your dangers with you, and in all contests to stand by your side. Soldier of the queen, in me you shall always have a comrade. With you I will fight for her, with you die for her, if it must be. We will have a common love for her, we will serve her in common, and with fidelity and love thank her for the good which she has done to you and your father."

"Blessings upon you, Margaret!" cried Toulan, as breaking into tears he rested his head upon the knee of his affianced. "Blessings on you, angel of my love and happiness!" Then he sprang up, and, drawing the young girl within his arms, he impressed a glowing kiss upon her lips.

"That is my betrothal kiss, Margaret; now you are mine; in this hour our souls are united in never-ending love and faithfulness. Nothing can separate us after this, for we journey hand in hand upon the same road; we have the same great and hallowed goal! Now come, my love, let us take our place before the altar of God, and testify with an oath to the love which we cherish toward our queen!"

He offered her his arm, and, both smiling, both with beaming faces, left the room, and joined the wedding guests who had long been waiting for them with growing impatience. They entered the carriages and drove to the church. With joyful faces the bridal pair pledged their mutual fidelity before the altar, and their hands pressed one another, and their eyes met with a secret understanding of all that was meant at that wedding. They both knew that at that moment they were pledging their fidelity to the queen, and that, while seeming to give themselves away to each other, they were really giving themselves to their sovereign.

At the conclusion of the ceremony, they left the church of St. Louis to repair to the wedding dinner, which Councillor Bugeaud had ordered to be prepared in one of the most brilliant restaurants of Versailles.

"Will you not tell me now, my dear son," he said to Toulan--"will you not tell me now why you wish so strongly to celebrate the wedding in Versailles, and not in Paris, and why in the church of St. Louis?"

"I will tell you, father," answered Toulan, pressing the arm of his bride closer to his heart. "I wanted here, where the country erects its altar, where in a few days the nation will meet face to face these poor earthly majesties; here, where in a few days the States-

General will convene, to defend the right of the people against the prerogative of the sovereign, here alone to give to my life its new consecration. Versailles will from this time be doubly dear to me. I shall owe to it my life's happiness as a man, my freedom as a citizen. They have done me the honor in Rouen to elect me to a place in the Third Estate, and as, in a few days, the Assembly of the Nation will meet here in Versailles, I wanted my whole future happiness to be connected with the place. And I wanted to be married in St. Louis's church, because I love the good King Louis. He is the true and sincere friend of the nation, and he would like to make his people happy, if the queen, the Austrian, would allow it."

"Yes, indeed," sighed the councillor, who, in spite of his relation to Madame de Campan, belonged to the opponents of the queen--" yes, indeed, if the Austrian woman allowed it. But she is not willing that France should be happy. Woe to the queen; all our misery comes from her!