er pride in this, that she could never
enter a family to which she was not welcome."

"Then her pride is stronger than her love! No, Madeleine, though your
firmness has been tested and I dread it, I will not believe that you
will continue so cruel as to refuse me your hand."

"Did you not say that it was happiness enough to know that,--that,"--

Madeleine had stumbled upon a sentence which it was not particularly
easy to finish.

"To know that you love me! that you love me! Let me repeat the words
over and over again, until my unaccustomed ears believe the sound; for
they are yet incredulous! But, Madeleine, you who are truth itself, how
could you have said that you loved another, even from the best of
motives?"

"I did not. I said that my affections were already engaged: yet I meant
you to believe, as you did, that I loved another; and the thought of the
deception, for it _was deception_, has caused me ceaseless contrition.
_I do not reconcile it to my conscience_; I spoke the words
_impulsively_ as the only means of forcing you to give up all claim to
my hand; _but I do not defend those words_."

"And I do not forgive them! You can only win my pardon by promising me
that you will openly contradict them, and atone for your error by
becoming my wife."

Madeleine's agitated features composed themselves to a look of
determination which made Maurice tremble with apprehension; and he had
cause, for she said,--

"I cannot, Maurice,--I cannot,--must not,--will not be your wife without
the consent of your father and your grandmother!"

"But if it be impossible to obtain my grandmother's?"

"Then you must prove to me that you spoke truth by being content with
that knowledge which you declared _would_ satisfy you."

Maurice remonstrated, argued, prayed, but he did not shake Madeleine's
resolve. Believing she was right, she was as inflexible as the Countess
de Gramont herself.

CHAPTER LIII.

RESISTANCE.

Maurice could not tear himself away; he was still lingering by
Madeleine's side when Bertha and Gaston entered to pay their daily
visit. The perfect joy that rendered luminous the countenance of
Maurice, and the happy confusion depicted upon Madeleine's face,
demanded but few words of explanation. Bertha caught Madeleine in her
arms, laughing and crying, kissing her and reproaching her, over and
over again. Then she turned to Maurice, as if impelled to greet him
hardly less lovingly; but Gaston, jealou