But how? She could not tell, she never would know; simply
from her whole heart came the cry that she did indeed love him. The
light had come to her at last; this new, overpowering joy overwhelmed
her like the most ardent rays of the sun.

For a long time her tears flowed, but not from sorrow. On the contrary,
she was filled with an inexplicable confusion of happiness that was
indefinable, regretting now, more deeply than ever, that she had not
made a _confidante_ of Hubertine. To-day her secret burdened her, and
she made an earnest vow to herself that henceforth she would be as cold
as an icicle towards Felicien, and would suffer everything rather than
allow him to see her tenderness. He should never know it. To love
him, merely to love him, without even acknowledging it, that was the
punishment, the trial she must undergo to pardon her fault. It would be
to her in reality a delicious suffering. She thought of the martyrs of
whom she had read in the "Golden Legend," and it seemed to her that she
was their sister in torturing herself in this way, and that her guardian
angel, Agnes, would look at her henceforward with sadder, sweeter eyes
than ever.

The following day Angelique finished the mitre. She had embroidered with
split silk, light as gossamer, the little hands and feet, which were the
only points of white, naked flesh that came out from the royal mantle of
golden hair. She perfected the face with all the delicacy of the purest
lily, wherein the gold seemed like the blood in the veins under the
delicate, silken skin. And this face, radiant as the sun, was turned
heavenward, as the youthful saint was borne upward by the angels toward
the distant horizon of the blue plain.

When Felicien entered that day, he exclaimed with admiration:

"Oh! how exactly she looks like you."

It was an involuntary expression; an acknowledgment of the resemblance
he had purposely put in the design. He realised the fact after he had
spoken, and blushed deeply.

"That is indeed true, my little one; she has the same beautiful eyes
that you have," said Hubert, who had come forward to examine the work.

Hubertine merely smiled now, having made a similar remark many days
before, and she was surprised and grieved when she heard Angelique reply
in a harsh, disagreeable tone of voice, like that she sometimes had in
her fits of obstinacy years ago:

"My beautiful eyes! Why will you make fun of me in that way? I know as
well as you do th