o compromise--I will not say
my reputation, but my happiness," she said, meaningly, with a glance at
the young Breton. "You know very well how suspicious Conti can be; if he
knew--"

"Who will tell him?"

"He is coming back here to fetch me," said Beatrix.

Calyste turned pale. In spite of all that Camille could urge, in spite
of Calyste's entreaties, Madame de Rochefide remained inflexible, and
showed what Camille had called her obstinacy. Calyste left Les Touches
the victim of one of those depressions of love which threaten, in
certain men, to turn into madness. He began to revolve in his mind some
decided means of coming to an explanation with Beatrix.

XII. CORRESPONDENCE

When Calyste reached home, he did not leave his room until dinner time;
and after dinner he went back to it. At ten o'clock his mother, uneasy
at his absence, went to look for him, and found him writing in the midst
of a pile of blotted and half-torn paper. He was writing to Beatrix, for
distrust of Camille had come into his mind. The air and manner of the
marquise during their brief interview in the garden had singularly
encouraged him.

No first love-letter ever was or ever will be, as may readily be
supposed, a brilliant effort of the mind. In all young men not tainted
by corruption such a letter is written with gushings from the heart, too
overflowing, too multifarious not to be the essence, the elixir of many
other letters begun, rejected, and rewritten.

Here is the one that Calyste finally composed and which he read aloud to
his poor, astonished mother. To her the old mansion seemed to have
taken fire; this love of her son flamed up in it like the glare of a
conflagration.

Calyste to Madame la Marquise de Rochefide.

Madame,--I loved you when you were to me but a dream; judge,
therefore, of the force my love acquired when I saw you. The dream
was far surpassed by the reality. It is my grief and my misfortune
to have nothing to say to you that you do not know already of your
beauty and your charms; and yet, perhaps, they have awakened in no
other heart so deep a sentiment as they have in me.

In so many ways you are beautiful; I have studied you so much
while thinking of you day and night that I have penetrated the
mysteries of your being, the secrets of your heart, and your
delicacy, so little appreciated. Have you ever been loved,
understood, adored as you deserve to be?

Let me tell you now