ABSTRACT
Vansittart's friends at St. Cloud perceived a strangeness in his conduct in those days. He seemed, after his return, to avoid them. They wondered why, and could not guess that the man was torn asunder by the strength of his will, fighting against a love which had grown, during the later months, into a passion. The Comtesse de Fontainebleau was blessed with seeing eyes, and an unerring divination in matters of the heart. What was dark to others, was to her as clear as daylight. At the function five days later in the Rue Galilee, she sank and curved into a profound curtsey before M. Ribou. Ribou had taken the Prince incognito to one of the noisiest of the Socialist meetings, where it had been previously arranged by the Minister that the young man's name should be loudly acclaimed.
