s of his own particular rights,
interposed. She darted away from his restraining arms and danced about
the room, shouting like a gleeful child; then she kissed Madeleine
again; then, suddenly calming down, said to Gaston, reproachfully,--

"And you,--_you_ knew this all the time, and did not tell me? What
penalty can I make you pay that will be severe enough? I will plot
mischief with Madeleine. If we can punish you in no other manner, we
will postpone to a tantalizing distance the day you wish near at hand.
Confess that I was wise to wait! I knew Madeleine's lover would claim
her in good season, but I never suspected he was my own dear cousin
Maurice, whom she so resolutely rejected."

"Nor did I!" cried Maurice, joyously; "and if _I_ can forgive Gaston,
you must."

"All in good time; after he is fitly punished, not before! What do you
say, Madeleine? Shall we promise these two hapless swains their brides a
couple of years hence?"

"Bertha, Bertha! you have not understood," answered Madeleine, gravely,
yet with a happy smile on her sweet lips. "Maurice has no promise of a
bride; he looks forward to no bride, though I trust, you will, before
very long, give one to M. de Bois."

"Dear me!" exclaimed Bertha, completely sobered by this unexpected
announcement. "I thought you had confessed to Maurice that _he_ was the
mysterious but fortunate individual whom you loved, and whom I have been
puzzling my brains to discover."

Madeleine did not choose to respond to the statement made with such
straightforward ingenuousness by Bertha, and only replied,--

"Madame de Gramont would never give her consent to the marriage of
Maurice with the humble mantua-maker. I have too much of the de Gramont
pride, or too much pride of my own, or too much of some stronger feeling
which I can only translate into a sense of right and fitness, to become
the wife of Maurice in the face of such opposition."

Bertha looked sorely disappointed and vexed, but vented her spleen upon
the one whom she loved best, according to the invariable practice of
women. She said to Gaston,--

"There! you are no better off than you were before! That's just what you
deserve for keeping this secret from me!"

"But, Bertha, you will not be so unreasonable," urged Madeleine.

"Why not, when you set me the example? Why should I not be unreasonable
and obstinate when you teach me how to be so? You know, Madeleine, you
have been my model all my life long, and it