in her father's house, only the old dog was left to welcome her more
permanent abode there; and one would have thought he was sensible of the
added responsibilities death and absence had devolved upon him.
Forsaking his long-accustomed place on the sunny pavement of the south
stone courtyard, he established himself at the door of the salon if she
was within it, himself not being privileged to enter there--or with his
young mistress in her own little turret-chamber, where he had all
_entrees_--or even to her favourite arbour in the garden he contrived to
creep with her, though his old limbs were too feeble to accompany her
beyond that short distance. And when they were alone together, he would
look up in her face with such a "human meaning" in his dim eyes, as
spoke to Madelaine's heart, as plainly and more affectingly than words
could have spoken--"I only am left to love my master's daughter, and who
but she cares for old Roland?"

In the mean time, Walter's year of probation was fast drawing to a
close; and his return to St Hilaire, and all thereon depending, was
looked forward to with very different feelings by himself (the happy
expectant!) by the inhabitants of the Chateau, and by its still
occasional inmate, the little Maiden of the Manoir, whose meditations on
the subject were not the less frequent and profound, because to her it
was obviously one of little personal interest. Monsieur and Madame de St
Hilaire had watched with intense anxiety the fancied progress of the
Marquis d'Arval in supplanting the absent Walter in the affections of
their daughter. But experience had taught them that the surest means of
effecting their wishes was to refrain from expressing them to the
dutiful Adrienne. So they looked on, and kept silence, with hopes that
became fainter as the decisive period approached, and they observed that
the lovers' correspondence was unslackened, and the Marquis made no
interesting communication to them of that success on his part which, he
was well aware, they would receive as most gratifying intelligence. On
the contrary, he found it necessary, about this time, to make a journey
to Paris, and to his estates in Languedoc; but as he still seemed
devoted to Adrienne, and his devotions were evidently accepted with the
sweetest complacency, the bewildered parents still cherished a belief
that the young people mutually understood each other--that d'Arval's
temporary absence had been concerted between them,