taking both
Isaura's hands in her own, and stroking them fondly.

"My child, I have such good news for thee! Thou hast escaped--thou art
free!" and then she related all that M. Rameau had said, and finished by
producing the copy of Gustave's unhallowed journal.

When she had read the latter, which she did with compressed lips and
varying colour, the girl fell on her knees--not to thank Heaven that she
would now escape a union from which her soul so recoiled--not that she
was indeed free, but to pray, with tears rolling down her cheeks, that
God would yet save to Himself, and to good ends, the soul that she had
failed to bring to Him. All previous irritation against Gustave was
gone: all had melted into an ineffable compassion.

CHAPTER VII.

When, a little before noon, Gustave was admitted by the servant into
Isaura's salon, its desolate condition, stripped of all its pretty
feminine elegancies, struck him with a sense of discomfort to himself
which superseded any more remorseful sentiment. The day was intensely
cold: the single log on the hearth did not burn; there were only two
or three chairs in the room; even the carpet, which had been of gaily
coloured Aubusson, was gone. His teeth chattered; and he only replied
by a dreary nod to the servant who informed him that Madame Venosta was
gone out, and Mademoiselle had not yet quitted her own room.

If there be a thing which a true Parisian of Rameau's stamp associates
with love of woman, it is a certain sort of elegant surroundings, a
pretty boudoir, a cheery hearth, an easy fauteuil. In the absence of
such attributes, "fuyit retro Venus." If the Englishman invented the
word comfort, it is the Parisian who most thoroughly comprehends the
thing. And he resents the loss of it in any house where he has been
accustomed to look for it, as a personal wrong to his feelings.

Left for some minutes alone, Gustave occupied himself with kindling the
log, and muttering, "Par tous les diables, quel chien de rhume je vais
attraper?" He turned as he heard the rustle of a robe and a light slow
step. Isaura stood before him. Her aspect startled him. He had come
prepared to expect grave displeasure and a frigid reception. But the
expression of Isaura's face was more kindly, more gentle, more tender,
than he had seen it since the day she had accepted his suit.

Knowing from his mother what his father had said to his prejudice, he
thought within himself, "After all, the poor g