ounced, to go forth once more and contribute to the happiness of
humanity.

When, therefore, in the drawing-room of the Manor, the address was read
to her, and this appeal rang upon her ears, she felt herself turn dizzy
and faint: her whole life seemed to reel backwards to all she had lost,
and the tyranny of the present bore down upon her with a cruel weight.
It needed all her courage and all her innate strength to rule herself to
composure. For an instant the people in the room were a confused mass,
floating away into a blind distance. She heard, however, the quick
breathing of the Seigneur beside her, and it called her back to an
active and necessary confidence.

With a smile she received the address, and, turning, handed it to Louis,
smiling at him too with a winning duplicity, for which she might never
have to ask forgiveness in this world or the next. Then she turned
and spoke. Eloquently, simply, she gave out her thanks for the gift of
silver and the greater gift of kind words; and said that in her quiet
life, apart from that active world of the stage, where sorrow and sordid
experience went hand in hand with song, where the delights of home were
sacrificed to the applause of the world, she would cherish their gift as
a reward that she might have earned, had she chosen the public instead
of the private way of life. They had told her of the paths of glory, but
she was walking the homeward way.

Thus deftly, and without strain, and with an air of happiness even, did
she set aside the words and the appeal which had created a storm in her
soul. A few moments afterwards, as the old house rang to the laughter of
old and young, with dancing well begun, no one would have thought that
the Manor of Pontiac was not the home of peace and joy. Even Louis
himself, who had had his moments of torture and suspicion when the
appeal was read, was now in a kind of happy reaction. He moved about
among the guests with less abstraction and more cheerfulness than he had
shown for months. He carried in his hand the address which Madelinette
had handed him. Again and again he showed it to eager guests.

Suddenly, as he was about to fold it up for the last time and carry it
to the library, he saw the name of George Fournel among the signatures.
Stunned, dumfounded, he left the room. George Fournel, whom he had tried
to kill, had signed this address of congratulation to his wife! Was it
Fournel's intention thus to show that he had forgiv