d chaise, had recrossed the Loire, they both were unready to
speak. In these circumstances, the first words that break the silence
are full of terrible meaning.

"Do you know how much I love you?" said the journalist point blank.

Victory might gratify Lousteau, but defeat could cause him no grief.
This indifference was the secret of his audacity. He took Madame de la
Baudraye's hand as he spoke these decisive words, and pressed it in both
his; but Dinah gently released it.

"Yes, I am as good as an actress or a _grisette_," she said in a voice
that trembled, though she spoke lightly. "But can you suppose that a
woman who, in spite of her absurdities, has some intelligence, will have
reserved the best treasures of her heart for a man who will regard her
merely as a transient pleasure?--I am not surprised to hear from your
lips the words which so many men have said to me--but----"

The coachman turned round.

"Here comes Monsieur Gatien," said he.

"I love you, I will have you, you shall be mine, for I have never felt
for any woman the passion I have for you!" said Lousteau in her ear.

"In spite of my will, perhaps?" said she, with a smile.

"At least you must seem to have been assaulted to save my honor," said
the Parisian, to whom the fatal immaculateness of clean muslin suggested
a ridiculous notion.

Before Gatien had reached the end of the bridge, the outrageous
journalist had crumpled up Madame de la Baudraye's muslin dress to such
an effect that she was absolutely not presentable.

"Oh, monsieur!" she exclaimed in dignified reproof.

"You defied me," said the Parisian.

But Gatien now rode up with the vehemence of a duped lover. To regain a
little of Madame de la Baudraye's esteem, Lousteau did his best to hide
the tumbled dress from Gatien's eyes by leaning out of the chaise to
speak to him from Dinah's side.

"Go back to our inn," said he, "there is still time; the diligence does
not start for half an hour. The papers are on the table of the room
Bianchon was in; he wants them particularly, for he will be lost without
his notes for the lecture."

"Pray go, Gatien," said Dinah to her young adorer, with an imperious
glance. And the boy thus commanded turned his horse and was off with a
loose rein.

"Go quickly to La Baudraye," cried Lousteau to the coachman. "Madame is
not well--Your mother only will know the secret of my trick," added he,
taking his seat by Dinah.

"You call such infamous con