“My son is coming home to-morrow,” said the old Marquis.

Mademoiselle de SÉguy drew the white fur of her hood closer together under her chin.

“Yes,” she answered; “it has seemed a long time.”

“Two months,” said M. de Vauvenargues, “two months. He saved Aix, you know.”

“Oh yes,” replied the girl vaguely. “Oh yes.”

They were walking up and down the hard gravel paths of the garden of Luc’s home in Aix; a faint film of frost lay over the water in the fountain basin, but the air was clear and bright, and through the damp rotting leaves on the flower-beds the first white and green of the snowdrops showed.

“Why has he been away so long?” asked ClÉmence again. “He was out of the plague in a few days.”

“He has been gaining strength,” returned the Marquis. “He was very, very ill. The doctor told me that it was one of God’s marvels that he has recovered at all. He has never been strong since the campaign in Bohemia.”

The girl glanced covertly at the noble, proud, and haggard face of her companion.

“There is something I want to ask you,” she said hurriedly.

“Yes, my child,” he answered gravely.

“Is he—will he be able to go to Madrid?”

A dark look clouded the old man’s eyes.

“Why do you want to know? Is it not enough that he is coming home to-morrow?” he replied.

“Yes; ah, yes. But I wondered—his career.”

The Marquis flashed round on her.

“Do you think of his career when his life has only been spared by a miracle?”

She shrank away from him.

“For his sake I think of it,” she answered piteously. “He was always so ardent for—glory.”

An expression so terrible, so swiftly distorting, passed over the fine features of the Marquis that ClÉmence stopped in her walk to stare at him.

“Come into the house,” he said, gripping her arm. “I wish to speak to you.”

She murmured some awed response, and came obediently.

They entered the dark, heavy dining-room by the window where Luc had stood the day of his return from the war, and watched his father, his brother, and the bright dogs in the summer garden.

The Marquis closed the window. There was a great fire on the hearth, and ClÉmence crouched close to it, mechanically loosening her furred cloak and pulling off her doeskin gloves.

M. de Vauvenargues seated himself on the other side of the long black polished table. His erect, massive figure; his old-fashioned, handsome clothes; his aristocratic, proud, yet simple and kindly face, were flooded with red light from the fire, which threw it up against the sombre background of the dark chamber that always, even on the most brilliant day, seemed filled with shadows.

He leant a little forward, and fixed his eyes on the rosy vision of the young girl in her white fur, white silk, and gold laces.

“You love Luc, do you not?” he asked, in a terrible voice.

Her eyes widened, holding his in a full stare of terror.

“Take care what you commit yourself to,” he continued. “Think before you answer. Do you love my son?”

“Yes,” answered ClÉmence. “How strange for you to ask me, Monseigneur!”

“You have never been to see him—not even when all fear of infection was over.”

She flushed painfully.

“He did not wish me to—you told me so yourself.”

“Well, you will see him to-morrow, ClÉmence.” The strong voice was touched with tenderness and sorrow. “And you love him? You know what that means?—Love?”

“Yes, yes,” shivered ClÉmence.

For a while—a very little while—the Marquis was silent; then he said—

“Luc will not be able to go to Madrid.”

“Ah!” she murmured.

“He wrote yesterday,” continued the Marquis, “to refuse the post. He will never be able to do any work again.”

ClÉmence clenched her hands on her lap.

“He is—not strong enough?”

“No.”

“He has—no career?”

“No.”

“I do not quite understand.” She frowned over her words. “He is recovered?”

“He will never completely recover.”

“Monseigneur, you frighten me. What has happened to Luc?”

“Whatever has happened it can make no difference to us who love him,” answered the Marquis. His eyes held ClÉmence with a power before which she blenched.

“No, of course not,” she said in a laboured way “But—I am sorry for Luc,” she ended feebly.

“Mademoiselle,” replied M. de Vauvenargues proudly, “this is not a thing one is sorry for. It is a great tragedy.”

“A—tragedy?”

“The word frightens you? But remember that it is in your power to soften it. Luc has lost everything—but you.”

“Oh!” she murmured again. “Yet if he is well——”

The Marquis lifted his head still higher, never taking his eyes from her changing face.

“You have seen people who have had the plague?”

She gave some miserable little exclamation under her breath. He waited for her to find words.

“He is changed?” she managed at last.

“Yes.”

She tried to smile.

“Well, I suppose—not much.”

“A great deal.”

ClÉmence rose, sat down, and rose again.

“Changed—very much?”

“So changed,” said the Marquis slowly, “that only those who love him would know him.”

“Monseigneur, you try to frighten me!”

“You have to see him to-morrow.”

Her breast heaved and her soft eyes were rebellious.

“He was—beautiful,” she murmured. “I think he had no right. He did not think of me.”

“He kept the plague from you—from Aix.”

She took no notice.

“For a vagabond’s child,” she continued—“for the sake of a thing of nought!”

“No,” interrupted the Marquis sternly, “for the sake of his honour.”

ClÉmence dropped again into the great black chair by the fire.

“You will be here to welcome him to-morrow?” he added. “He speaks of you so often.”

She did not reply.

“Why do you not answer?” he asked harshly.

“Oh, I shall be here,” she answered. “I was thinking of—how differently—I dreamed it.”

She rose again, picked up her swansdown-edged muff, her gloves, her cane, and fastened her cloak at the chin.

“Good-bye, Monseigneur,” she said timidly. “My father will bring me to-morrow. I will go now—I think—the horses will be tired—of waiting.”

She curtsied and was turning away when the Marquis rose suddenly and stood between her and the door.

“Mademoiselle,” he said hoarsely.

She stopped and looked at him. He was no longer erect, no longer haughty. He looked old and bitterly troubled. He stood in a deprecating attitude before her delicate young loveliness.

“Forgive me if I was harsh,” he said thickly. “I have no right perhaps to ask what I do.”

She shuddered violently.

“I entreat you not to forsake my son,” continued the old man passionately—“I implore you.”

She closed her eyes.

“I will not deceive you, Mademoiselle. He is—to a woman’s eyes—you may imagine.”

She shrank against the wall.

The Marquis continued, forcing the words out in almost incoherent agitation—

“You know what I wish to say, Mademoiselle. You must see him to-morrow. His strength has gone—and his comeliness. He could not use—a sword—or ride a horse—he—— Oh, my God!”

He brought his hands to his grey hair with a gesture of agony.

ClÉmence quivered into a little sob; she opened her eyes fearfully.

“This is a great scourge,” continued the Marquis, struggling for command over himself—“a great scourge. I want to tell you everything. He is—almost—blind.”

His head sank as if he had confessed a crime. But this humiliation of his fine nobility was lost on ClÉmence; his words alone impressed her.

“Why was I not told before?” she asked frantically.

“We had not the courage,” the old man confessed. “And if you love him——”

“Oh, if I love him!” she interrupted. “I loved the Luc de Clapiers that was!”

“He is still the same in spirit, still my son, still your lover. Why, this is a chance for you.” He spoke with piteous eagerness. “You used to say how you wished you could prove your love. Do you not remember? Luc told me once—he spoke like a man who holds the Eucharist in his hands when he told me that you had said you wished you could prove—— This is your chance.”

Her heaving bosom, her eyes, the rise and fall of colour in her cheeks bespoke desperation.

“And you have told me again—just now, that you love him.”

“Monseigneur, give me time—let me think. This is very terrible. I pity him—oh, how I pity him!”

“Pity him! You should be proud of him.”

“Yes, that too—but I am distracted—give me time.”

“There is no time. He is coming home to-morrow. There is your chance, Mademoiselle; you must meet him—as if—he were the same.”

She put her hands before her eyes.

“I do not think—I can,” she whispered.

The Marquis flashed into wild anger.

“Then you never loved him! You were toying with youth and gallantry, and his devotion was but like a brooch to your gown—and you vowed constancy because it sounded pretty, and you liked to be with him because he was a graceful cavalier—you did not love him for his noble soul as it walked before God!”

She cowered and trembled under his fierce rush of words.

“But you pretended you did, Mademoiselle, and now you shall pay the penalty of your pretence.”

She could not answer. He caught her wrist. Then his wrath died, and he was old, and broken, and pitiful again.

“Mademoiselle—my son used to kiss you?”

She stared forlornly.

“Think of him when he used to kiss you.”

Her face flushed.

“Ah, Monseigneur!”

“Forgive an old man, very humble before your beauty. I think no one else ever kissed you?”

“Never,” she said fiercely—“never—nor he often; I could not bear it, for I loved him—too much.”

She drew her hand away, and as if her own words had loosened memories of too sweet a rapture to be endured she began to weep hotly.

“You can never forsake him!” cried the Marquis. “No—no—and you will make life so pleasant to him that he will not regret even—glory.”

He took the hem of her cloak and kissed it.

“Thank God for women like you.”

She looked up with wet and terrified eyes.

“Do not praise me—I do not know myself—I must have been very young—a few months ago—I said things I did not understand. Let me go, Monseigneur.”

She made an effort to pass him, but he arrested her.

“You will not leave me like this, Mademoiselle. He is not so changed—I wanted to prepare you, that is all—his mother thought there was very little difference.”

“Ah, his mother,” murmured ClÉmence. “I was to be his wife.”

“You will be. I will do anything for you—anything. You shall live in Aix—we shall all worship you—and you will be happy.”

“But if I cannot make him happy?” she asked mournfully.

“You will, you will, you must! He loves you—there will be nothing else in the world for him.” The old man could not contain his anguish of apprehension. “Do not tell me that you could forsake him!”

She dried her eyes on a little handkerchief she took from her muff; after a few seconds of self-control she spoke gently—

“Monseigneur, I shall be here to-morrow. I am not going to break the promise I gave Luc. I am quite—content—only a little shocked. Please do not grieve so—he might have died, you know.” She smiled wistfully.

He kissed her hands, and she felt his hard wrung tears on them. When he raised his head she leant forward and kissed his poor wrinkled cheek, then left him swiftly with no backward look.

“Might have died,” she wailed to herself as she shivered down the hall; “he ought to have died for every one’s sake—feeble, disfigured, nearly—blind!”

Such a tumult of terror seized her as she fled from the house of the de Clapiers that she was aware of nothing but the tremendous beating of her heart that seemed to echo through her whole body.