cried the lieutenant.

"Don't interrupt me, Dumay. For the last two months Modeste has taken as
much care of her personal appearance as if she expected to meet a lover.
She has grown extremely fastidious about her shoes; she wants to set off
her pretty feet; she scolds Madame Gobet, the shoemaker. It is the
same thing with her milliner. Some days my poor darling is absorbed in
thought, evidently expectant, as if waiting for some one. Her voice has
curt tones when she answers a question, as though she were interrupted
in the current of her thoughts and secret expectations. Then, if this
awaited lover has come--"

"Good heavens!"

"Sit down, Dumay," said the blind woman. "Well, then Modeste is gay. Oh!
she is not gay to your sight; you cannot catch these gradations; they
are too delicate for eyes that see only the outside of nature. Her
gaiety is betrayed to me by the tones of her voice, by certain accents
which I alone can catch and understand. Modeste then, instead of sitting
still and thoughtful, gives vent to a wild, inward activity by impulsive
movements,--in short, she is happy. There is a grace, a charm in the
very ideas she utters. Ah, my friends, I know happiness as well as I
know sorrow; I know its signs. By the kiss my Modeste gives me I can
guess what is passing within her. I know whether she has received what
she was looking for, or whether she is uneasy or expectant. There are
many gradations in a kiss, even in that of an innocent young girl, and
Modeste is innocence itself; but hers is the innocence of knowledge,
not of ignorance. I may be blind, but my tenderness is all-seeing, and I
charge you to watch over my daughter."

Dumay, now actually ferocious, the notary, in the character of a
man bound to ferret out a mystery, Madame Latournelle, the deceived
chaperone, and Madame Dumay, alarmed for her husband's safety, became
at once a set of spies, and Modeste from this day forth was never left
alone for an instant. Dumay passed nights under her window wrapped in
his cloak like a jealous Spaniard; but with all his military sagacity
he was unable to detect the least suspicious sign. Unless she loved the
nightingales in the villa park, or some fairy prince, Modeste could have
seen no one, and had neither given nor received a signal. Madame Dumay,
who never went to bed till she knew Modeste was asleep, watched the
road from the upper windows of the Chalet with a vigilance equal to her
husband's. Under these