Meanwhile Monsieur Maurice,
whose good-nature was at least as inexhaustible as my curiosity, went on
changing the slides till we had gone through a whole boxfull.
By this time it was getting rapidly dusk, and I could see no longer.
"You will show me some more another day?" said I, giving up reluctantly.
"That I will, petite, I have at least a dozen more boxes full of slides."
"And--and you said I should see your sketches, Monsieur Maurice."
"All in good time, little Gretchen," he said, smiling. "All in good time.
See--those are the sketches, in yonder folio; that mahogany case under the
couch contains a collection of gems in glass and paste; those red books in
the bookcase are full of pictures. You shall see them all by degrees; but
only by degrees. For if I did not keep something back to tempt my little
guest, she would not care to visit the solitary prisoner."
I felt myself colour crimson.
"But--but indeed I would care to come, Monsieur Maurice, if you had nothing
at all to show me," I said, half hurt, half angry.
He gave me a strange look that I could not understand, and stroked my hair
caressingly.
"Come often, then, little one," he said. "Come very often; and when we are
tired of pictures and microscopes, we will sit upon the floor, and tell
sad stories of the deaths of kings.
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