sorrow.

"Happiness can never be mine, Amelie," said Heloise, after a lapse of
several minutes. "I have long feared it, now I know it. Le Gardeur loves
Angelique; he is wholly hers, and not one little corner of his heart is
left for poor Heloise to nestle in! I did not ask much, Amelie, but I
have not retained the little interest I believed was once mine! He has
thrown the whole treasure of his life at her feet. After playing with
it, she will spurn it for a more ambitious alliance! Oh, Amelie!"
exclaimed she with vivacity, "I could be wicked! Heaven forgive me! I
could be cruel and without pity to save Le Gardeur from the wiles of
such a woman!"

The night was a stormy one; the east wind, which had lain in a dead lull
through the early hours of the evening, rose in all its strength at the
turn of the tide. It came bounding like the distant thud of a cannon. It
roared and rattled against the windows and casements of the Manor House,
sounding a deep bass in the long chimneys and howling like souls in
torment amid the distant woods.

The rain swept down in torrents, as if the windows of heaven were opened
to wash away the world's defilements. The stout walls of the Manor House
were immovable as rocks, but the wind and the rain and the noise of the
storm struck an awe into the two girls. They crept closer together in
their bed; they dared not separate for the night. The storm seemed
too much the reflex of the agitation of their own minds, and they lay
clasped in each other's arms, mingling their tears and prayers for Le
Gardeur until the gray dawn looked over the eastern hill and they slept.

The Chevalier de Pean was faithful to the mission upon which he had been
despatched to Tilly. He disliked intensely the return of Le Gardeur
to renew his old ties with Angelique. But it was his fate, his cursed
crook, he called it, ever to be overborne by some woman or other, and
he resolved that Le Gardeur should pay for it with his money, and be so
flooded by wine and debauchery that Angelique herself would repent that
she had ever invited his return.

That she would not marry Le Gardeur was plain enough to De Pean, who
knew her ambitious views regarding the Intendant; and that the Intendant
would not marry her was equally a certainty to him, although it did not
prevent De Pean's entertaining an intense jealousy of Bigot.

Despite discouraging prospects, he found a consolation in the reflection
that, failing his own vain effor