"Oh! oh!" said Andrea, "you need not be ashamed, even though you did post after me. Was I not nearly your husband?"
And with this raillery Andrea went out, leaving the two girls a prey to their own sufferings of shame and to the commentaries of the crowd. An hour after they stepped into their caléche, both dressed in female attire. The gate of the hotel had been closed to screen them from sight, but they were forced, when the door was open, to pass through a throng of curious glances and whispering voices.
Eugénie closed her eyes; but though she could not see, she could hear, and the sneers of the crowd reached her in the carriage.
"Oh! why is not the world a wilderness?" she exclaimed, throwing herself into the arms of Mademoiselle d'Armilly, her eyes sparkled with the same kind of rage which made Nero wish that the Roman world had but one neck, that he might sever it at a single blow.
The next day they stopped at the Hôtel de Flandres, at Brussels. The same evening Andrea was secured in the Conciergerie.
