it had ever produced in her. He was
so imperious in his tranquillity, he argued his question of love with
such a manifest preponderance of right on his side, that she had
always felt that to yield to him would be to confess the omnipotence
of his power. She knew now that she must yield to him,--that his
power over her was omnipotent. She was pressed by him as in some
countries the prisoner is pressed by the judge,--so pressed that she
acknowledged to herself silently that any further antagonism to him
was impossible. Nevertheless, the word which she had to speak still
remained unspoken, and he stood over her, waiting for her answer.
Then slowly he sat down beside her, and gradually he put his arm
round her waist. She shrank from him, back against the stonework of
the embrasure, but she could not shrink away from his grasp. She put
up her hand to impede his, but his hand, like his character and his
words, was full of power. It would not be impeded. "Alice," he said,
as he pressed her close with his arm, "the battle is over now, and I
have won it."

"You win everything,--always," she said, whispering to him, as she
still shrank from his embrace.

"In winning you I have won everything." Then he put his face over her
and pressed his lips to hers. I wonder whether he was made happier
when he knew that no other touch had profaned those lips since last
he had pressed them?

CHAPTER LXXV

Rouge et Noir

Alice insisted on being left up in the churchyard, urging that she
wanted to "think about it all," but, in truth, fearing that she might
not be able to carry herself well, if she were to walk down with her
lover to the hotel. To this he made no objection, and, on reaching
the inn, met Mr Palliser in the hall. Mr Palliser was already
inspecting the arrangement of certain large trunks which had been
brought down-stairs, and was preparing for their departure. He was
going about the house, with a nervous solicitude to do something,
and was flattering himself that he was of use. As he could not
be Chancellor of the Exchequer, and as, by the nature of his
disposition, some employment was necessary to him, he was looking to
the cording of the boxes. "Good morning! good morning!" he said to
Grey, hardly looking at him, as though time were too precious with
him to allow of his turning his eyes upon his friend. "I am going up
to the station to see after a carriage for to-morrow. Perhaps you'll
come with me." To this propos