ought, and will. On
my knees I entreat you to fly with me."

"I cannot," murmured she; "it is impossible."

"Then you do not love me," said he in desponding accents. "I have been
a thrice-besotted fool to believe that your heart was mine, for you can
never have loved me."

"Hear him, merciful powers! he says that I, who am all his, do not love
him."

"Then why cast aside our only chance of safety?"

"Norbert, dearest Norbert!"

"I understand you too well; you are alarmed at the idea of the world's
censure, and----"

He paused, checked by the gleam of reproach that shone in Diana's eyes.

"Must it be so?" said she; "must I condescend to justify myself? You
talk to me of the world's censure? Have I not already defied it, and has
it not sat in judgment upon me? And what have I done, after all? Every
act and word that has passed between us I can repeat to my mother
without a blush rising to my cheek; but would any one credit my words?
No, not a living soul. Most likely the world has come to a decision. My
reputation is gone, is utterly lost, and yet I am spotless as the driven
snow."

Norbert was half-mad with anger.

"Who would dare to treat you with anything save the most profound
respect?" said he.

"Alas! my dear Norbert," replied she, "to-morrow the scandal will be
even greater. While your father was talking to me with such brutal
violence and contempt, he was overheard by a woodcutter and perhaps by
some of his companions."

"It cannot be."

"No, it is quite true," returned Daumon. "I had it from the man myself."

Mademoiselle de Laurebourg shot one glance at the Counsellor; it was
only a glance, but he comprehended at once that she wished to be left
alone with her lover.

"Pardon me," said he, "but I think I have a visitor, and I must hinder
any one from coming in here."

He left the room as he spoke, closing the door noisily behind him.

"And so," resumed Norbert when alone, "it seems that the Duke de
Champdoce did not even take the ordinary precaution of assuring himself
that you were in privacy before he spoke as he did, and was so carried
away by his fury that he never thought that in casting dishonor upon
you, he was heaping infamy on me. Does he think by these means to compel
me to marry the heiress whom he has chose for me, the Mademoiselle de
Puymandour?"

For the first time Diana learned the name of her rival.

"Ah!" moaned she between her sobs, "so it is Mademoiselle de Puymandour