preading them out their full
length, as though otherwise they might fail to accomplish their object,
and, clasping him to his bosom, he cried:

"Ah! my dear count, how grand you are! You are immense as the world!"

CHAPTER VIII

Abbe Miollens hastened to repair to Cormeilles, where he gave a faithful
circumstantial account of his conference with Count Larinski. He was
still warm from the interview, and he gave free vent to the effusions of
his enthusiasm. He struck up a Canticle of Zion in honour of the antique
soul, the celestial soul, which had just been revealing to him all its
hidden treasures. M. Moriaz, both astonished and scandalized, observed,
dryly:

"You are right, this Pole is a prodigy; he should either be canonized or
hanged, I do not know which."

Antoinette said not a word; she kept her reflections to herself. She
retired to her chamber, where she paced to and fro for some time,
uncertain regarding what she was about to do, or, rather more restless
than uncertain. Several times she approached her writing-table, and
gazed earnestly at her inkstand; then, seized with a sudden scruple, she
would move away. At last she formed a resolute decision, seized her pen,
and wrote the following lines:

"MONSIEUR: Before setting out for Vienna, will you be so good as to come
and pass some moments at Cormeilles? I desire to have a conversation
with you in the presence of my father.

"Accept, monsieur, I beg of you, the expression of my most profound
esteem.

"ANTOINETTE MORIAZ."

The next morning she received by the first mail the response she
awaited, and which was thus fashioned:

"This test would be more than my courage could endure. I never shall see
you again, for, should I do so, I would be a lost man."

This short response caused Mlle. Moriaz a disappointment full of
bitterness, and blended with no little wrath. She held in her hand a
pencil, which she deliberately snapped in two, apparently to console
herself for not having broken the proud and obstinate will of Count
Abel Larinski. And yet can one break iron or a diamond? The carrier
had brought her at the same time another letter, which she opened
mechanically, merely to satisfy her conscience. She ran through the
first lines without succeeding in comprehending a single word that she
read. Suddenly her attention became riveted, her face brightened up,
her eyes kindled. This letter, which a kind Providence had sent her as a
supreme resource i