hey
consisted of four or five incoherent words crippled by shame. M. de
Mauprat returned to his study, and I had sat down again, hoping that
my cousin was going to send away her duenna and talk to me. But they
exchanged a few words in a whisper; the duenna remained, and two mortal
hours passed without my daring to stir from my chair. I believe Edmee
really was asleep this time. When the bell rang for dinner her father
came in again to fetch me, and before leaving her room he said to her
again:

"Well, have you had a chat?"

"Yes, father, dear," she replied, with an assurance that astounded me.

My cousin's behaviour seemed to me to prove beyond doubt that she
had merely been trifling with me, and that she was not afraid of my
reproaches. And yet hope sprang up again when I remembered the strain in
which she had spoken of me to Mademoiselle Leblanc. I even succeeded in
persuading myself that she feared arousing her father's suspicions, and
that she was now feigning complete indifference only to draw me the more
surely to her arms as soon as the favourable moment had arrived. As it
was impossible to ascertain the truth, I resigned myself to waiting. But
days and nights passed without any explanation being sent, or any secret
message bidding me be patient. She used to come down to the drawing-room
for an hour in the morning; in the evening she was present at dinner,
and then would play piquet or chess with her father. During all this
time she was so well watched that I could not exchange a glance with
her. For the rest of the day she remained in her own room--inaccessible.
Noticing that I was chafing at the species of captivity in which I was
compelled to live, the chevalier frequently said to me:

"Go and have a chat with Edmee. You can go to her room and tell her that
I sent you."

But it was in vain that I knocked. No doubt they had heard me coming and
had recognised me by my heavy shuffling step. The door was never opened
to me. I grew desperate, furious.

Here I must interrupt the account of my personal impressions to tell you
what was happening at this time in the luckless Mauprat family. John and
Antony had really managed to escape, and though a very close search
had been made for them, they had not as yet been captured. All their
property was seized, and an order issued by the courts for the sale of
the Roche-Mauprat fief. As it proved, however, a sale was unnecessary.
M. Hubert de Mauprat put an end to the