When Raphael, absorbed in happy musing, had forgotten the
existence of the newspaper, Pauline flew upon it, crumpled it up into
a ball, and threw it out into the garden; the kitten sprang after the
rotating object, which spun round and round, as politics are wont to
do. This childish scene recalled Raphael to himself. He would have
gone on reading, and felt for the sheet he no longer possessed. Joyous
laughter rang out like the song of a bird, one peal leading to
another.
"I am quite jealous of the paper," she said, as she wiped away the
tears that her childlike merriment had brought into her eyes. "Now, is
it not a heinous offence," she went on, as she became a woman all at
once, "to read Russian proclamations in my presence, and to attend to
the prosings of the Emperor Nicholas rather than to looks and words of
love!"
"I was not reading, my dear angel; I was looking at you."
Just then the gravel walk outside the conservatory rang with the sound
of the gardener's heavily nailed boots.
"I beg your pardon, my Lord Marquis--and yours, too, madame--if I am
intruding, but I have brought you a curiosity the like of which I
never set eyes on. Drawing a bucket of water just now, with due
respect, I got out this strange salt-water plant.
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