e the day or the night of a
reconciliation to make us acquainted; the awkwardness of the first
interview, the figure all three of us will cut,--I don't see anything
particularly pleasant in that."

"I have taken possession of you for my own amusement!" she said with
an imperious air, "so please don't preach."

I saw she was decided, so surrendered myself to circumstances. I began
to laugh at my predicament and we became exceedingly merry. We again
changed horses. The mysterious torch of night lit up a sky of extreme
clearness and shed around a delightful twilight. We were approaching
the spot where our tete-a-tete must end. She pointed out to me at
intervals the beauty of the landscape, the tranquillity of the night,
the all-pervading silence of nature. In order to admire these things
in company as it was natural we should, we turned to the same window
and our faces touched for a moment. In a sudden shock she seized my
hand, and by a chance which seemed to me extraordinary, for the stone
over which our carriage had bounded could not have been very large, I
found Madame de T----- in my arms. I do not know what we were trying
to see; what I am sure of is that the objects before our eyes began in
spite of the full moon to grow misty, when suddenly I was released
from her weight, and she sank into the back cushions of the carriage.

"Your object," she said, rousing herself from a deep reverie, "is
possibly to convince me of the imprudence of this proceeding. Judge,
therefore, of my embarrassment!"

"My object!" I replied, "what object can I have with regard to you?
What a delusion! You look very far ahead; but of course the sudden
surprise or turn of chance may excuse anything."

"You have counted, then, upon that chance, it seems to me?"

We had reached our destination, and before we were aware of it, we had
entered the court of the chateau. The whole place was brightly lit up.
Everything wore a festal air, excepting the face of its master, who at
the sight of me seemed anything but delighted. He came forward and
expressed in somewhat hesitating terms the tenderness proper to the
occasion of a reconciliation. I understood later on that this
reconciliation was absolutely necessary from family reasons. I was
presented to him and was coldly greeted. He extended his hand to his
wife, and I followed the two, thinking of my part in the past, in the
present and in the future. I passed through apartments decorated with
exqu