possessed of
the worthiest knowledge; he will be, like you, an honor to his country,
which he may assist in governing, helped by you, whose standing will be
so high; but I will strive to make him faithful to his first affections.
Madeleine, dear creature, has a noble heart; she is pure as the snows
on the highest Alps; she will have a woman's devotion and a woman's
graceful intellect. She is proud; she is worthy of being a Lenoncourt.
My motherhood, once so tried, so tortured, is happy now, happy with an
infinite happiness, unmixed with pain. Yes, my life is full, my life
is rich. You see, God makes my joy to blossom in the heart of these
sanctified affections, and turns to bitterness those that might have led
me astray--"

"Good!" cried the abbe, joyfully. "Monsieur le vicomte begins to know as
much as I--"

Just then Jacques coughed.

"Enough for to-day, my dear abbe," said the countess, "above all, no
chemistry. Go for a ride on horseback, Jacques," she added, letting her
son kiss her with the tender and yet dignified pleasure of a mother.
"Go, dear, but take care of yourself."

"But," I said, as her eyes followed Jacques with a lingering look, "you
have not answered me. Do you feel ill?"

"Oh, sometimes, in my stomach. If I were in Paris I should have the
honors of gastritis, the fashionable disease."

"My mother suffers very much and very often," said Madeleine.

"Ah!" she said, "does my health interest you?"

Madeleine, astonished at the irony of these words, looked from one to
the other; my eyes counted the roses on the cushion of the gray and
green sofa which was in the salon.

"This situation is intolerable," I whispered in her ear.

"Did I create it?" she asked. "Dear child," she said aloud, with one of
those cruel levities by which women point their vengeance, "don't
you read history? France and England are enemies, and ever have been.
Madeleine knows that; she knows that a broad sea, and a cold and stormy
one, separates them."

The vases on the mantelshelf had given place to candelabra, no doubt to
deprive me of the pleasure of filling them with flowers; I found them
later in my own room. When my servant arrived I went out to give him
some orders; he had brought me certain things I wished to place in my
room.

"Felix," said the countess, "do not make a mistake. My aunt's old room
is now Madeleine's. Yours is over the count's."

Though guilty, I had a heart; those words were dagger thrusts c