e has a peculiar solemnity?" said the
abbe. "If so, what grounds for distrusting it have you?"

I looked at him fixedly, and as he appeared very much agitated, I took
a pleasure in keeping him on the rack, hoping that he would repeat my
words to Edmee.

"None," I answered. "Only I observe that you are afraid that M. de
la Marche may break off the marriage, if he happens to hear of the
adventure at Roche-Mauprat. If the gentleman is capable of suspecting
Edmee, and of grossly insulting her on the eve of his wedding, it seems
to me that there is one very simple means of mending matters."

"What would you suggest?"

"Why, to challenge him and kill him."

"I trust you will do all you can to spare the venerable M. Hubert the
necessity of facing such a hideous danger."

"I will spare him this and many others by taking upon myself to avenge
my cousin. In truth, this is my right, Monsieur l'Abbe. I know the
duties of a gentleman quite as well as if I had learnt Latin. You may
tell her this from me. Let her sleep in peace. I will keep silence, and
if that is useless I will fight."

"But, Bernard," replied the abbe in a gentle, insinuating tone, "have
you thought of your cousin's affection for M. de la Marche?"

"All the more reason that I should fight him," I cried, in a fit of
anger.

And I turned my back on him abruptly.

The abbe retailed the whole of our conversation to the penitent. The
part that the worthy priest had to play was very embarrassing. Under the
seal of confession he had been intrusted with a secret to which in his
conversations with me he could make only indirect allusions, to bring
me to understand that my pertinacity was a crime, and that the only
honourable course was to yield. He hoped too much of me. Virtue such as
this was beyond my power, and equally beyond my understanding.

X

A few days passed in apparent calm. Edmee said she was unwell, and
rarely quitted her room. M. de la Marche called nearly every day,
his chateau being only a short distance off. My dislike for him grew
stronger and stronger in spite of all the politeness he showed me.
I understood nothing whatever of his dabblings in philosophy, and I
opposed all his opinions with the grossest prejudices and expressions at
my command. What consoled me in a measure for my secret sufferings was
to see that he was no more admitted than myself to Edmee's rooms.

For a week the sole event of note was that Patience took up his ab