ll not get another word
out of me, and you may think what you like."

"Oh! godmother!" whispered Celeste, yielding to the freshness of her
feelings, "suppose it were he!"

And the tears filled her eyes as she pressed Madame Thuillier's hand.

At this moment the servant threw open the door of the salon, and,
singular complication! announced Monsieur Felix Phellion.

The young professor entered the room, bathed in perspiration, his cravat
in disorder, and himself out of breath.

"A pretty hour," said Phellion, sternly, "to present yourself."

"Father," said Felix, moving to the side of the room where Madame
Thuillier and Celeste were seated, "I could not leave before the end of
the phenomenon; and then I couldn't find a carriage, and I have run the
whole way."

"Your ears ought to have burned as you came," said la Peyrade, "for you
have been for the last half-hour in the minds of these ladies, and a
great problem has been started about you."

Felix did not answer. He saw Brigitte entering the salon from the
dining-room where she had gone to tell the man-servant not to bring in
more trays, and he hurried to greet her.

After listening to a few reproaches for the rarity of his visits and
receiving forgiveness in a very cordial "Better late than never,"
he turned towards his pole, and was much astonished to hear himself
addressed by Madame de Godollo as follows:--

"Monsieur," she said, "I hope you will pardon the indiscretion I have,
in the heat of conversation, committed about you. I have told these
ladies where I met you this morning."

"Met me?" said Felix; "if I had the honor to meet you, madame, I did not
see you."

An almost imperceptible smile flickered on la Peyrade's lips.

"You saw me well enough to ask me to keep silence as to where I had met
you; but, at any rate, I did not go beyond a simple statement; I said
you saw Pere Anselme sometimes, and had certain scientific relations
with him; also that you defended your religious doubts to him as you do
to Celeste."

"Pere Anselme!" said Felix, stupidly.

"Yes, Pere Anselme," said la Peyrade, "a great mathematician who does
not despair of converting you. Mademoiselle Celeste wept for joy."

Felix looked around him with a bewildered air. Madame de Godollo fixed
upon him a pair of eyes the language of which a poodle could have
understood.

"I wish," he said finally, "I could have given that joy to Mademoiselle
Celeste, but I think, madame, you are