The countess inclined her head in token of assent; but, as she did so, her eyes rested on the diminutive form of her son with an expression that savored of disdain. The look was unmotherly, and seemed to say, "How can a man of such insignificant appearance be the son of the stately Countess de Soissons?"

And indeed to a careless observer the words were not inappropriate to his dwarfish proportions. His head, which, between his excessively wide shoulders, was perched upon the top of a very long neck, was too large, much too large for his body. His face was narrow, his complexion swarthy, his sallow cheeks high and sunken. A nose slightly turned up, gave an expression of boldness to his countenance, increased by the shortness of his upper lip, which exposed to view two large front teeth that were almost ferocious in their size. On either side of his high, narrow forehead, his hair, instead of being worn according to the prevailing fashion, was suffered to fall in long elf-locks about his ears. Notwithstanding all these disadvantages, his eyes were so superlatively beautiful that they almost persuaded you into the belief that he was handsome. From their lustrous depths there streamed a meteoric splendor, which, more than words, revealed the genius, the enthusiasm, and the noble soul to which Nature had assigned such unworthy corporality.

Those speaking eyes were fixed upon the countess in tender sadness, while, in a respectful attitude near the door, he awaited her permission to approach.

She languidly extended her hand, and, Eugene coming forward, bent over and imprinted upon it a heartfelt kiss.

"My dear mother then consents?" said he, humbly.

"I know of no reason why I should refuse," replied the countess, carelessly. "Neither am I able to divine wherefore you make your request in a tone of such unusual solemnity. One would suppose that the little abbe has come to invite his mother to a confession of her sins, so portentous is his demeanor."

"Would I could receive that confession," exclaimed he, earnestly; "would I could look into my mother's heart and read the secrets there!"

"Indeed! and have you come hither to catechise your mother, then?" said the countess, with a frown.

"No, dear mother, no," cried Eugene, eagerly; "I have come to ask of you whether I may walk with head erect before the world, or whether I must die because of our dishonor?"

"An extraordinary alternative to present for my decision, certainly; and I confess that I am very curious to learn how it happens that I can assist you in your dilemma. Speak, then, and I will listen."

With these words the countess threw herself indolently into an arm- chair, and motioned Eugene to a seat. But he only advanced a step or two, and gazed wistfully upon her handsome, hardened face.

"Mother," said he, in a low, husky voice, "the soothsayer La Voisin has been arrested."

"Ah! what else?" asked the countess, with perfect composure.

"Her house is guarded, every corner has been searched, and her papers have all been seized."

"And what else?" repeated the countess.

Her son looked up, and a ray of hope shot athwart his pale and anxious face. "Nothing is talked of in Paris," continued he, "but the strange revelations connected with her arrest. It is said that she not only drew the horoscope of those who were accustomed to visit her, and gave them philters, but—but—"

"But," echoed the countess as her son paused.

"But that she prepared secret poisons, one of which, called 'La poudre de succession,' was specially designed for the use of those who wished to remove an inconvenient relative."

This time the countess was silent; her brow contracted, and she shivered perceptibly.

An involuntary cry burst from the lips of her son, which recalled her to a sense of her imprudence.

"What ails you?" asked she, abruptly. "Have you seen a ghost, that you cry out in a voice so unearthly?"

"Yes, mother, I have seen a ghost—the ghost of my father! "And while the countess grew pale, and her eyes dilated with fear, her unhappy son sank upon his knees before her, and clasped his hands with agony of apprehension.

"Mother, have mercy on me, and forgive me if, in the anguish of my writhing soul, I ask you whether you are innocent of my father's death?"

"Has any one dared to accuse me?" asked she, with a scowl.

"Ay! And so publicly, that men spoke of it together as I passed them in the streets to-day. Need I say that I was ready to die of grief as I heard the epithet of murderess applied to the mother who to me has been the ideal of beauty, goodness, and excellence, which my heart has worshipped to the exclusion of all other loves! My brain was on fire as I dashed through the scornful crowd, and made my way to you, mother, here to look upon your dear face, and read in your eyes your innocence of the hideous crime. We are alone with God: in mercy tell me, are you innocent or guilty?"

As he raised his face to hers, the countess saw there such powerful love struggling with his anguish, that her heart was touched, and the angry words she had meditated died upon her lips.

"These are cruel doubts wherewith to assail your mother, Eugene," said she, after a pause. "Follow me, and in the presence of your forefathers you shall he answered."

With a lofty bend of the head, she left the room, followed by her stricken child. They crossed a spacious hall, and traversed one after another the apartments of state which were thrown open to guests on occasions of great ceremony, and led to the grand hall of reception. At the farther end of this hall, under a canopy of purple velvet, surmounted by a ducal crown, were the two thrones which, on the days of these state receptions, the Count and Countess de Soissons were privileged to occupy in presence of their guests, provided his majesty were not of the number. This right they held by virtue of their connection with the royal house of France, and their close relationship to the Duke of Savoy. At the time of the marriage of his niece with the Count de Soissons, Cardinal Mazarin had obtained from Louis XIV. an acknowledgment of her husband as a prince of the blood, and, by virtue of this acknowledgment, his right to attend without invitation all court festivities, to appear at the public and private levees of the king, and in his own palace to sit upon a throne.

On either side of the throne-room of the Hotel de Soissons were ranged the portraits of their ancestors, in armor, in ducal or episcopal robes, in doublet and hose, or in flowing wigs. Silently the mother and son walked by the stately effigies of princes and princesses, until they had reached the farthest portrait there.

With outstretched arms the countess pointed to the likeness of a handsome man, clad in a rich court-suit, which well became his aristocratic figure. As he gazed upon the pleasant smile that illumined a face expressive of exceeding goodness, the eyes of young Eugene filled with tears.

His mother surveyed him with a curl of her lip.

"Tears!" said she. "And yet you stand before the portrait of your father, whom you accuse me of having murdered!"

"No, no," cried her son, eagerly, "I did not accuse, I—I—"

"You inquired," interrupted the countess, disdainfully. "And by your inquiry you insinuate that such a crime by the hand of your mother was not only possible, but probable."

"Unhappily, I have more than once seen La Voisin in your boudoir, mother."

The countess affected not to hear. "Then a son considers himself justifiable in asking of his mother whether or not she poisoned his father; he should do so with the sword of justice in his hand, not with an eyelid that trembles with cowardly tears."

"Mother, have pity on me," sobbed Eugene, throwing himself at her feet. "Do not answer my cruel question, for I read your innocence in the noble scorn that flashes from your eye, and beams from every feature of your dear, truthful face. Pardon me, beloved mother; pardon your repentant child."

"No, I shall not pardon the poltroon who, believing that his mother has disgraced his escutcheon, weeps like a woman over wrongs which he should avenge like a man. But I forgot. The little abbe of Savoy is not accustomed to wear a sword; HIS weapon is the missal. Go, then, to your prayers, and when you pray for your father's soul, ask forgiveness of God for your heartless and ungrateful conduct to his widow."

"Dear, dear mother, have pity!" sobbed Eugene, still kneeling at her feet.

"Was there any pity in your heart for me when you asked that shameful question?"

"I was demented," cried he; "maddened by the sneers that were flung at me in the streets to-day."

"And, to console yourself, you joined in the popular cry. 'Vox populi vox Dei,' I suppose, is your pious motto."

"Mother!" cried Eugene, springing to his feet, "crush me, if you will, under the weight of your anger, but do not stretch me upon the rack of your scorn. I am no devotee; and, if the king, my family, and yourself, are, forcing me into a career which is repugnant to every instinct of my manhood, pity me, if you will, but do not insult me."

"Pity you!" sneered the countess. "I am a woman; but he who would venture to pity ME, would receive my glove in his face for his insolence. Go, faint heart! You are fit for nothing but a whining priest, for there is not a spark of manhood within your sluggish breast. No generous blood of the princes of Savoy mantles in your sallow check; 'tis the ichorous fluid of the churchman Mazarin that- -"

"Mother!" thundered Eugene, with a force that gave the lie to her derisive words—"mother, you shall go no further in your disdain of me, for the blood of Savoy is seething within my veins, and I may, perchance, forget that she who so affronts my father's son, is my mother!"

"You have already forgotten," replied the countess, coldly. "My answer to your infamous charge shall be made not to you, but to your ancestors."

So saying, she bent her steps toward the ducal throne, and seating herself thereon, addressed her son:

"Eugene of Savoy, Prince of Carignan, Bourbon, and Piedmont, bend your knee before the mother that bore you, and hearken to her words."

The prince obeyed, and knelt at the foot of the throne.

The countess raised her arm, and pointed to the portraits that hung: around. "You have been witnesses," said she, addressing them all, "to the outrage which has been put upon me to-day by him who inherits your name, but not your worth. If I am the guilty wretch which he has pronounced me to be, strike me to the earth for my crimes, and justify his parricidal words. But you know that I am innocent, and that, with bitter tears, I lamented the death of my murdered husband!"

"Murdered!" exclaimed Eugene. "It is, then, true that he was murdered?"

"Yes," replied the countess, "he was murdered, but not by bowl or dagger."

With these words, she rose, and, slowly descending from her throne, she returned to the spot which she had left, and gazed mournfully upon her husband's portrait. "He was a noble, brave, and gallant prince," said she, softly. "He loved me unspeakably, and wherefore should I have taken the life of him whose whole pleasure lay in ministering to my happiness? What could I gain by the death of the dearest friend I ever had? Ah, never would he have mistrusted his Olympia! Had the envious rabble of Paris defamed me while he lived to defend my honor, it is not your father, Prince Eugene, that would have joined my traducers and outraged my woman-hood, as you have done to-day!"

"Forgive me," murmured the prince.

"Yes, my beloved," continued she, addressing the picture, "they accuse me of murdering thee, because they seek my ruin as they compassed thine."

"Who, dear mother, who?" cried Eugene, passionately. "Who are the fiends that murdered my father and calumniate my mother?"

"They are Louis XIV.," exclaimed the countess, "his minister
Louvois, and his two mistresses, De Montespan and De Maintenon."

"The king!" echoed Eugene, in a voice of such fury, that his mother turned her eyes from the portrait, and stared at him with amazement.

"You hate the king?" said she, hurriedly.

"Yes," said Eugene, his eyes flashing fire; "yes, I hate him."

"And why?"

"Do not ask me, mother; I dare not say wherefore I hate the king."

"Then I will tell you why. You hate him because you believe the scandalous reports which my enemies have spread throughout Europe as regards my relations, in years gone by, with Louis. You believe that your mother was once the king's mistress, and that, to hide her shame, she borrowed the name of the Count de Soissons."

Eugene made no reply.

"Ah, why have I no son to shelter me from these infamous suspicions! Why must I live and die under such false and disgraceful imputations?"

"Then, it is not true?" cried Eugene, joyfully. "You did not love the king, mother?"

"Yes, I did love him," said she, calmly, "and loved him as an
Italian alone can love."

Eugene groaned, and covered his face with his hands.

"I do not deny the love," continued the countess, "for it was all the work of Cardinal Mazarin. He brought me from Italy, and bade me win the king's heart and become a queen; and when he did so he added a recommendation to me to be a good, dutiful niece, and never to forget who it was had helped me to a crown. I saw the youth whom the cardinal desired me to love: the handsomest, wittiest, and most accomplished cavalier in France. I obeyed but too willingly, and Louis became the idol of my life."

"Then it is true that my mother was beloved by the king?" said
Eugene, sternly.

"Beloved by him, but never his mistress!" returned the countess, proudly. "Yes, he loved me as I did him, with the trust, the strength, the passion, that are characteristic of a first love. I was ambitious for him as well as for myself, and would have had him a monarch in deed as well as in name. I led him away from the frivolous regions of indolent enjoyment to the starry realms of poetry, art, and science; and, had Louis ever risen to the fame of Numa, I should have merited that of Egeria. But this conflicted with the ambition of the cardinal. He had no sooner comprehended the nature of the influence I exerted over his royal tool, than he poisoned his ear by insinuating that ambition, not love, was the spring of all my efforts to elevate him to the level of his magnificent destiny. Poor, weak Louis! He was anything that Cardinal Mazarin chose to make him; so at the word of command he ceased to love, and went to make an offering of his accommodating affections to Marie. She made him take an oath never to look at me again."

"Did he respect the oath?"

"Just so long as he loved Marie. I need not tell you that I suffered from his inconstancy. I was inexpressibly grieved; but pride upheld me, and Louis never received a word or look of reproach for his faithlessness. Meanwhile your father offered his hand, and before I accepted it he was made acquainted with the history of my heart. I concealed nothing from him, so that he was at once the confidant of my past sorrows, and their comforter."

"Thank you, dear, dear mother," said Eugene, tenderly. "In the name of all your children, let me thank you for your noble candor."

"I married the Prince de Soissons, and here, in presence of his assembled ancestors, I swear that I have kept unstained the faith I pledged him at the marriage-altar. Let the world belie me as it will, Olympia Mancini has ever been a spotless wife. So true is this, that Louis, when he had abandoned Marie, and had tired of his queen, returned to me with vows of a love which he swore had been the only genuine passion of his life; and when, as my husband's loyal wife, I repulsed the advances of his sovereign, that sovereign became my bitterest enemy. Not even after he had consoled himself with the insipid charms of that poor, flimsy creature, La Valliere, did Louis relent; his animosity, because of some witticism of mine on the subject of his hysterical mistress, has pursued me throughout life; not only me, but every member of my family. For a mere epigram I was banished from Paris, and your father stripped of a lucrative and honorable office. We managed after a time to return to court, but my enemies were more powerful than I. Through the jealousy of the Marquise de Montespan I was a second time banished; but before we left, your father fought two duels with noblemen who had circulated the calumnies which the marquise had originated concerning me. The Duke de Noailles was wounded, and the Chevalier de Grand Mercy killed. Although the challenges had been honorably sent and accepted, the Count de Soissons was summoned before the king and publicly rebuked. Oh, let me speak no longer of the contumely we endured during those bitter days! My husband died, blessing me, and cursing the selfish monarch who had ruined us both."

Eugene clinched his hand. "I shall remember the curse," cried he, "and it shall be verified if God give me strength, mother!"

"Yes, avenge us if you can, Eugene, but, until the day of reckoning come, we must be politic and wary. Be silent and discreet as I was, when, on being allowed to return to Paris, I humbled myself for my dear children's sake, and not only swore to write no more epigrams, but went in person to sue to Madame de Montespan for pardon and protection!"

"Mother, is it possible! Far better had it been for us to die obscurely in some provincial village, than purchase our admission to court at the price of such humiliation as that!"

"No, no—I had sworn to be revenged upon my persecutors, and no plan of vendetta could I carry out in a provincial village. Do you remember what I told my sons on the day of our return to the Hotel de Soissons?"

"Ay, mother, that do I. You said: 'Bow your heads in ostensible humility, but never forget that the Bourbons have robbed you of your inheritance. Never forget that if you are poor, it is because on some idle pretext of a conspiracy that never could be proved, Louis XIV. sequestered the estates of the Counts de Soissons.' These were your words, and you see that I have not forgotten them. They are the steel on which I have sharpened the hate I feel for the King of France. And now that its edge is keen, why may I not lift it against the man who belied my mother, and murdered my father? Oh mother, mother, why will you force me to become a priest?"

"What else could you become?" asked Olympia. "The king is your guardian, and he it is that from your childhood has destined you for the church."

"I hate this garb," exclaimed Eugene, touching his cassock. "My vocation is not for the priesthood, and, if I am called upon to utter compulsory vows, I feel that I shall disgrace my cloth. Dear mother, loosen the detested bonds that bind me to a listless and contemplative life! Gird me with a sword, and let me go out to battle with the world like a man!"

The countess looked disdainfully at the diminutive figure of her son, and raised her shoulders with contempt. "You a soldier!"

"Yes!" exclaimed Eugene, passionately. "Yes! My soul abhors the cloister, and yearns for the battle-field. While you have fancied that I was studying theology, I have been poring over the lives of great commanders; and, instead of preparing my soul for heaven, I have trained my body for earthly strife. Look not so compassionately upon my stature, mother. This body is slender, but 'tis the coat of mail that covers an intrepid soul, and I have hardened it until it can bid defiance to wind or weather. With this arm I curb the wildest horse, nor will its sinews yield to the blow of the most practised swordsman in France. I have studied the science of warfare in books: my life has been one long preparation for its practice, and I cannot, will not relinquish my day-dreams of glory."

"There is no help for it, I tell you. All princes of the blood are wards of the king: your royal guardian has chosen your profession, and you must either submit or bear the consequences of his wrath."

"What care I for his wrath? Let him give me my freedom, and I will promise never to seek my fortune at his hands."

"At all events, wait for some favorable opportunity to rebel, Eugene. We are poor and dependent now, and your brother's scandalous marriage has forever marred our hopes of seeing him heir to the duchy of Savoy. To think of a Prince de Carignan uniting himself to the daughter of the equerry of the Prince de Conde! What a disgrace!"

"My brother consulted his heart and not his escutcheon," replied Eugene, with a smile. "He followed the example of his father, and may God bless him with a wife as beautiful and as virtuous as his mother!"

The countess, who had begun to frown at Eugene's apology for his brother, could not resist this filial flattery. She gave him her hand, which he kissed devoutly.

"You no longer believe me guilty, my son?" said she. Eugene knelt and murmured: "Pardon, dear, dear mother! My life will be all too short to expiate my unworthy doubts, and to avenge your wrongs."

"Avenge them, but do not exasperate the king. Imitate Richelieu and
Mazarin, and the priest's gown will no longer be distasteful to you.
They were great in the field and in the cabinet, and both possessed
more than regal power, for both were the rulers of kings."

Eugene was about to reply, but Olympia raised her hand in remonstrance, and continued:

"I exact of you, for a time at least, apparent submission and perfect silence. When the hour is ripe for retaliation, you shall strike, and repay me for all that I have endured at the hands of the king. But, for the present, breathe not the name of Louis above a whisper. I have a deadlier foe than he to encounter now. Louvois, Louvois, I dread above all other men; and if you have the strength of a man in your arm, Eugene, let the force of its vengeance fall upon the head of him, whose animosity is more potent than that of all my other enemies united."

"It shall crush him and all who seek to injure you, mother. Revenge!—yes, revenge for your wrongs, for my father's death, and for MY bondage!"

"Ay, revenge, Eugene! A man may wear the garb of an ecclesiastic with the heart of a hero, and to your brave heart these Princes of Carignan commit my cause! Come, let us leave our ancestors to their grim repose. May they lend their ghostly aid to the arm that wields the carnal weapons of our righteous vengeance!"

As she turned to leave the gallery, the train of her blue satin dress became entangled in the claws of the lion which supported the throne. Eugene stooped hastily to release it, and, instead of dropping it again, he smiled affectionately upon his mother and placed himself in the attitude of a page.

The countess looked pleased at the attention, and said, "Have you learned, among your other accomplishments, to be a trainbearer?"

"Yes, mother, I have learned to be your trainbearer, but to no other mortal would I condescend to do such service."

But Olympia was not listening. She was day-dreaming again, and the substance of her dreams was as follows:

"How soon, perchance, the court of France may bear my train along, while I, victorious and exultant, crush the head of my enemies beneath my heel! I feel the glow of the philter as it courses through my veins, warming the blood that shall mantle in my cheeks, kindling the fire that shall flash from my eyes! The hour is nigh when I am to make my last supreme effort for mastery over the heart of Louis: if I fail—I have an avenger in Eugene, who—"

At this moment an outcry was heard in the streets, and as Olympia opened the door of her cabinet, she was confronted by her steward, who, unannounced, stood pale as death before his astonished mistress.