Such was Ayesha, or Aisse, the Circassian maid, when at last her “owner” returned to Paris to fall under the spell of her radiant beauty and to claim her as his chattel, bought with good gold and trained at his cost to adorn his harem.  In vain did Aisse weep and plead to be spared a fate from which every fibre of her being shrank in horror.  Her “master” was inexorable.  “When I bought you,” he said, “it was my intention to make you my daughter or my mistress.  I now intend that you shall become both the one and the other.”  Friendless and helpless, she was obliged to yield; and for six years she had to submit to the endearments of her protector, a man more than old enough to be her father, until his death brought her release.

At twenty-four, more lovely than ever, combining the beauty of the Circassian with the graces of France, Aisse had now every right to look forward at least to such happiness as was possible to a stranger in a strange land.  But no sooner was one danger to her peace removed than another sprang up to take its place.  The rumour of her beauty and her sweetness had come to the ears of the Regent, and strong forces were at work to bring her to his arms.  Madame de Tencin was the leader in this base conspiracy, with the power of the Romish Church at her back; for with the fair Circassian high in the Regent’s favour and a pliant tool in their hands, the Jesuits’ influence at Court would be greatly strengthened.  Dubois was won over to the unholy alliance; and the Due’s maitresse en titre was bribed, not only to withdraw all opposition to her proposed rival, but to arrange a meeting between the Regent and the victim.

Success seemed to be assured.  Mademoiselle Aisse was to exchange slavery to her late owner for an equally odious place in the harem of the ruler of France.  Her tears and entreaties were all in vain; when she begged on her knees to be allowed to retire to a convent Madame de Feriol turned her back on her.  Her only hope of rescue now lay in the Regent himself; and to him she pleaded her cause with such pathetic eloquence that he not only allowed her to depart in peace, but with words of sympathy and promises of his protection in the pure and noble sense of the word.

Thus by the chivalry of the most dissolute man of his age the Circassian slave-girl was rescued from a life which to her would have been worse than death—­to spend her remaining years, happy in the love of an honest man, the Chevalier d’Aydie, until death claimed her while she still possessed the beauty which had been at once her glory and her inevitable shame.

* * * * *

The close of the Regent’s mis-spent life came with tragic suddenness.  Worn out with excesses, while still young in years, his doctors had warned him that death might come to him any day; but with the light-heartedness that was his to the last, he laughed at their gloomy forebodings and refused to take the least precautions to safeguard his health.  Two days before the end came he declined point-blank to be bled in order to avert a threatened attack of apoplexy.  “Let it come if it will,” he said, with a laugh.  “I do not fear death; and if it comes quickly, so much the better!”