rters had removed
everything, and she had left no address behind for kind inquirers.

CHAPTER VI.

PAID IN FULL.

And whither, then, had Fanny vanished so suddenly, so untraceably, with
her aunt?

It was with a feeling of despair that Teresa had listened to her niece's
confession. The girl had told her honestly that she was in love, in love
body and soul, with all the fervour of her nature, with an ideal whom
she had believed to be identical with the benefactor whose benefits she
had one day meant to repay with a love stronger than death; and now,
discovering that her secret patron was not he whom she had dreamed of,
he whom once she had actually seen, and could never again forget, her
heart was full of horror. She now felt that she had acted improperly in
accepting money from that other man under any pretext whatsoever, for by
so doing she had placed herself under an obligation, and she trembled at
the thought of it, and feared to show her face in the street lest she
should meet him. A distrust of that face grew up in her heart, and she
shuddered at the idea that _that_ man was thinking of her, perhaps. Ah,
that was indeed a thorn in her soul! And the other, the ideal, there was
no reason for thinking of him at all now; and yet cast him out of her
heart again she could not. She knew him not, she knew not even his name,
yet she felt that she would love him henceforth to the last moment of
her life.

Poor Alexander!

So Teresa saw the labours of these many years all in ruins, and in the
bitterness of her despair she brought herself to take a step which, at
one time, the greatest misery would have been powerless to make her
do--she went to Boltay, told him everything, and entreated him to
defend, to protect the girl, for this was a case where female protection
was insufficient.

Boltay accepted the guardianship with joy. The coarse-handed artisan's
big face turned dark red with rage, and he did not go to his factory
that day, lest he should pitch into some one; but he gave orders that
Teresa's belongings should be carried into his house that very night.
Alexander, who heard everything, became very sorrowful, but was doubly
attentive to Fanny. It was a case of hopeless love all round. He loved
the girl and the girl loved another, and both were very unhappy.

Every one in the family knew the secret, but nobody said a word about
it. The two old people often laid their heads together, and sometimes
Alexande