ou
really wish me to accept your offer," replies Mademoiselle Dufresnoy,
taking out her purse, "I suppose I must say--yes."

And with this, she puts out her hand for the hook, and offers me in
return the sum of five and twenty francs.

Pained at having to accept the money, pained at being offered it, seeing
no way of refusing it, and feel altogether more distress than is
reasonable in a man brought up to the taking of fees; I affect not to
see the coin, and, bowing, move away in the direction of my own door.

"Pardon, Monsieur," she says, "but you forget that I am in your debt."

"And--and do you really insist..."

She looks at me, half surprised and half offended.

"If you do not take the money, Monsieur, how can I take the book?"

Bowing, I receive the unwelcome francs in my unwilling palm.

Still she lingers.

"I--I have not thanked you as I ought for your generosity," she says,
hesitatingly.

"Generosity!" I repeat, glancing with some bitterness at the five and
twenty francs.

"True kindness, Monsieur, is neither bought nor sold," says the lady,
with the loveliest smile in the world, and closes her door.

CHAPTER XLII

THE OLD, OLD STORY.

What thing is Love, which nought can countervail?
Nought save itself--even such a thing is Love.

SIR W. RALEIGH.

My acquaintance with Hortense Dufresnoy progressed slowly as, ever, and
not even the Froissart incident went far towards promoting it. Absorbed
in her studies, living for the intellect only, too self-contained to
know the need for sympathy, she continued to be, at all events for me,
the most inaccessible of God's creatures. And yet, despite her
indifference, I loved her. Her pale, proud face haunted me; her voice
haunted me. I thought of her sometimes till it seemed impossible she
should not in some way be conscious of how my very soul was centred in
her. But she knew nothing--guessed nothing--cared nothing; and the
knowledge that I held no place in her life wrought in me at times till
it became almost too bitter for endurance.

And this was love--real, passionate, earnest; the first and last love of
my heart. Did I believe that I ever loved till now? Ah! no; for now only
I felt the god in his strength, and beheld him in his beauty. Was I not
blind till I had looked into her eyes and drunk of their light? Was I
not deaf till I had heard the music of her voice? Had I ever truly
lived, or breathed, or known delight till now?

I