ondently so much as in
dismay. The thing which he had to tell was so very bad! He felt it so
keenly, not on his own account so much as on account of his friend!
All that was expressed by the manner in which Peter shook his head.
"What truth have you found out, Peter? Tell me at once," said Madame
Staubach.

"She has got a--lover."

"Who? Linda! I do not believe it."

"She has owned it. And such a lover!" Whereupon Peter Steinmarc
lifted up both his hands.

"What lover? Who is he? How does she know him, and when has she seen
him? I cannot believe it. Linda has never been false to me."

"Her lover is--Ludovic Valcarm."

"Your cousin?"

"My cousin Ludovic--who is a good-for-nothing, a spendthrift, a
fellow without a florin, a fellow that plays cards on Sundays."

"And who fears neither God nor Satan," said Madame Staubach. "Peter
Steinmarc, I do not believe it. The child can hardly have spoken to
him."

"You had better ask her, Madame Staubach." Then with some
exaggeration Peter told Linda's aunt all that he did know, and
something more than all that Linda had confessed; and before their
conversation was over they had both agreed that, let these tidings be
true in much or in little, or true not at all, every exertion should
be used to force Linda into the proposed marriage with as little
delay as possible.

"I overheard him speaking to her out of the street window, when they
thought I was out," said the town-clerk in a whisper before he left
Madame Staubach. "I had to come back home for the key of the big
chest, and they never knew that I had been in the house." This had
been one of the occasions on which Linda had been addressed, and had
wanted breath to answer the bold young man who had spoken to her.

CHAPTER IV

On the following morning, being Sunday morning, Linda positively
refused to get up at the usual hour, and declared her intention of
not going to church. She was, she said, so ill that she could not go
to church. Late on the preceding evening Madame Staubach, after she
had left Peter Steinmarc, had spoken to Linda of what she had heard,
and it was not surprising that Linda should have a headache on the
following morning. "Linda," Madame Staubach said, "Peter has told me
that Ludovic Valcarm has been--making love to you. Linda, is this
true?" Linda had been unable to say that it was not true. Her aunt
put the matter to her in a more cunning way than Steinmarc had done,
and Linda felt her