nto it like a
startled fawn. Among its pebbles her feet still ran on, under the chill
of icy water. The garden-gate was at last reached, it closed, and she
disappeared.

CHAPTER VII

For two days Angelique was conscience-smitten. As soon as she was alone,
she sobbed as if she had done something wrong. And this question, which
she could not answer, came constantly to her mind: Had she sinned in
listening to this young man? Was she lost, like the dreadful women in
the Legend, who, having been tempted, had yielded to the Devil? Was life
to-day as it was centuries ago? The words, so softly uttered, "I love
you," still resounded with such a tumult in her ears, and she was
confused, yet pleased by them to such a degree, that they must certainly
have come from some terrible power hidden in the depth of the invisible.
But she knew not--in fact, how could she have known anything in the
ignorance and solitude in which she had grown up? Her anguish was
redoubled by this mysterious and inexplicable struggle within her.

Had she sinned in making the acquaintance of Felicien, and then in
keeping it a secret? She recalled to her mind, one by one, all the
details of her daily experience during the past few weeks; she argued
with her innocent scruples.

What was sin, in short? Was it simply to meet--to talk--and afterwards
to tell a falsehood to one's parents? But that could not be the extent
of the evil. Then why was she so oppressed? Why, if not guilty, did she
suddenly seem to have become quite another person--as agitated as if
a new soul had been given her? Perhaps it was sin that had made her
so weak and uncomfortable. Her heart was full of vague, undefined
longings--so strange a medley of words, and also of acts, in the future,
that she was frightened by them, without in the least understanding
them. The blood mounted to her face, and exquisitely coloured her
cheeks, as she heard again the sweet, yet appalling words, "I love you";
and she reasoned no longer, but sobbed again, doubting evident facts,
fearing the commission of a fault in the beyond--in that which had
neither name nor form.

But that which especially distressed her now was that she had not made a
_confidante_ of Hubertine. Could she only have asked her what she wished
to know, no doubt the latter with a word would have explained the whole
mystery to her. Then it seemed to her as if the mere fact of speaking to
someone of her trouble would have cured her. Bu