"You love me?' she said, under her breath, and without waiting for any sort of reply she glided away and was gone. He stood for at least two minutes with the curtain in his hand, staring in a sort of bewilderment, long after she had vanished.

III.

A FEW Weeks later, after his visit to frozen Paris, Frank Morley found himself once more at Château Maupas, this time, wonderful to tell, as the accepted lover of Mademoiselle de Saint-Flor. Frank never knew, and did not much try to find out, how Albert had conquered the prejudices of his parents. There may have been more reasons than one for their consenting. Besides the solid advantage of belonging to a rich and generous Englishman, this marriage was, perhaps, seen by them to be a way out of a painful difficulty. Frank was afterwards conscious that the whole explanation was very clear, if he had cared to think it out; but he was a chivalrous fellow, and thinking it out seemed almost an impertinence, both to the poor proud people who bowed their heads in such a stately way to circumstances, and to their beautiful unhappy daughter. He came to Maupas by special invitation, on his way back to Bordeaux, joining Albert, who had gone before to smooth the way for him.

a

The snow was gone, but the weather was still bitterly cold; frosty wind made music among the dark shivering firs, and howled dismally about the high roofs of the château. Frank thought it all looked even more desolate than when it was buried in snow, and there was hardly enough cheerfulness indoors to make up for the dismal weather.

Albert was the only person who received him with any animation. Monsieur and Madame de SaintFlor were grave and polite; Marguérite, though her smile made him understand that he was very welcome, looked, if possible, sadder than ever. Her eyelids were heavy, as if she had been crying. By the end of the evening, the discovery that they were not to be left alone together had thrown Frank into a state bordering on frenzy. What was the use of being engaged if they were to behave to each other like strangers, if they might not even talk unheard by other people? Frank resolved that either these manners and customs should give way before his English will, or else that he would leave the château the next day, and see none of them again till it was time to be married. He could not annoy his lady-love and her parents by any open rebellion, but he promised himself that Albert should know his mind on the subject; and he gave it him that evening in the smokingroom, after Monsieur de SaintFlor had left them and gone to bed.

'Certainly, my dear friend; what you ask is only reasonable,' said the amiable Albert. Trust to me. I will do everything. My mother naturally keeps to her own ways, and expects Marguérite to conform to them. But I will arrange that you shall have an interview to-morrow. Trust to me.'

"Thank you,' said Frank, with satirical earnestness. 'If you fail to make that arrangement, sir, I shall make it myself.'

He smoked in silence for a few minutes. Albert also looked very grave, perceiving that his friend was out of temper, and perhaps feeling himself in an awkward position between these jarring nationalities.

'Marguérite looks terribly sad. What on earth is the matter with her? As I have no chance of asking herself, I must ask you,' said Frank presently.

'How should I know? She is of a melancholy temperament,' said Albert.

'There I differ from you. She is as capable of being happy as any one else. Do you know of anything that ought to make her unhappy at this moment?'

Frank fixed his eyes on Albert's thin dark face, which certainly looked grave and puzzled at the question. But it was answered immediately.

'Nothing, I should say, that ought to make her unhappy.'

What is it, then? There is something.'

Albert shrugged his shoulders, and became impenetrable.

Presently they went up-stairs together. The young Frenchman left his future brother-in-law, still rather injured and sulky, in a large state bedroom, given him in honour of his new position in the family. A fire was burning on the low hearth. Two candles hardly lighted the high dark room, which was hung with old faded tapestry. The flames, as they flared and fell, seemed to make a sudden stir among the ghostly figures on the walls. A crowd of pale-faced hunters on white horses would come riding forward, dogs would run among the trees, peacocks would wave their once shining tails in the light.

Frank, as he had told Marguérite, was not superstitious. He glanced once round the room, and then, pulling up a great chair in front of the fire, sat down and thought about that sad white face, those dear wistful eyes that seemed to be for ever asking the same question that once had made its way into words, ' You love me?'—

a question which, it seemed to him, he had never been allowed to answer properly. Could she doubt him? Was that why she looked so sad? Had she consented to this match for any reason but to please herself—any idea of duty to her family? He promised himself to have that all made clear to-morrow.

A little noise, like a door opening gently, made him turn his head and look round the room again: seeing nothing, he supposed there must be rats behind the wainscot, and returned to the fire and his meditations. At the far corner of the room there was a door opening into a dressing-room, which again communicated with the passages. Frank, full of other thoughts, had not noticed this entrance; and now he was not at all aware that a hand was pushing the dressing-room door, and that eyes were peeping at him from behind it. Footsteps on the boards of his room, however, with the slight tap of a stick, slowly approaching him, made him spring from his chair in real surprise. Standing by the table, on which François had arranged the materials for eau sucrée, was a small elderly lady, dressed in black, with a fair sharp face, a suspicious expression, and a quantity of white hair rolled up high over a cushion. She wore long gloves, and carried a cane in her hand. Frank stared at her in speechless surprise.

'I am not a ghost, monsieur, and you have seen me before,' she said. Her voice had a sort of disagreeable snap in it.

Frank recognised the old aunt who had looked out of her window that snowy morning, and had told him to take care what he was doing. He bowed politely.

'Pardon me, madame. I remember you very well,' he said. Can I do anything for you?'

Nothing at all,' she said, with a slight toss of her head. 'I am come here to do you a kindness. Give me a chair. Is it true that you are to marry my niece, Mademoiselle de Saint-Flor?'

She sat down, placed her feet on a footstool, and looked at him magisterially. Frank thought she was probably mad. He stood opposite to her, at the further end of the table, and answered her very meekly.

'Yes, madame, I am to have that honour.'

'I suspected it from the moment I saw you in the garden, and since then I have heard all about it. My brother was obliged to tell me. He can never keep a secret, poor man. I suppose he thought I had forgotten the past, or that I should not venture to interfere again. But no, I would not sit in my tower and see a fine young man sacrificed. Did you ever hear of Grégoire de la Masselière ?'

'No,' said Frank, as she waited for an answer.

mere child then. Well, they were betrothed, and then the war broke out, and my son Léon went straight to the front and was killed in the first battle. Do you understand?' 'Perfectly, madame,' said Frank gravely.

The story improves as it goes on. After that, in the winter, we arranged that my second son, Célestin, should marry Marguérite. I did it all out of kindness to my brother, remember. Célestin also was in the army. He was killed in the spring in the last battle.'

Frank could not restrain a slight shiver. There was something quite awful in the Comtesse's sharp voice, her cold eyes, her air of repressed excitement, with quick nervous little movements of her two thin hands.

'After that,' she said, 'you would have thought, perhaps, they might have had the decency to send the girl to a convent. But no; she must make a good match in spite of everything. They waited only two years, and then they arranged a marriage for her with

'No.'

'Or of my son, Léon de Maupas, and his brother Célestin?' 'No, madame.'

'Very well. Listen, and I will tell you a little history about those four young men. It is more than nine years since the war. In those days I and my two sons lived here in this house, and my brother and his wife and those children of his were miserably poor people living at Tours. Out of kindness to my brother I arranged that my elder son, the Comte de Maupas, should marry that girl Marguérite, though I never cared for her to my eyes she always had misfortune written on her face. But my son admired her, and he was willing enough. She was a

strong and handsome as yourself. But I knew he would not livewhy should he, when my sons died? A week before the marriage he was out shooting, and he shot himself by accident-accident !'

Madame de Maupas raised her voice almost to a scream, and ended this part of her story with a little shrill laugh, which made Frank feel colder than ever.

Good,' she said, going on more quietly. Now we come to the fourth, to Grégoire de la Masselière. He was only three years ago-for, let me tell you, people talked about all this, and saw plainly that it would be tempting Fate to ally themselves with such an unlucky young person. But this worthy man had been abroad

out his feelings with the demon strative candour natural to him, which did not seem to offend this French lady. Her English lover seemed to her a charming and wonderful creature; perhaps a little wild and unmanageable, but still a creature with whom one could be amazingly happy-if only things would go well. The shadow of the past still clouded her eyes and saddened her smile. Could any mortal man be master of Fate? Certainly, if any one, Frank Morley.

'I know you think me very sad and stupid,' she said by and by. 'Believe me, I have had a good deal to make me so. Only take care of yourself, and I shall forget it all presently.'

'Am I in any danger, then?' said Frank.

"O no; not any real danger! But I think we are an unlucky family. Perhaps some day I may be able to tell you why.'

But

'Tell me now, can't you? in the mean time you need hardly wear mourning for me in prospect, Marguérite. I have not the smallest intention of dying at present.'

He was twining one of her black ribbons round his fingers as he spoke.

'Ah,' she said, with almost a little cry, I ought never to have allowed it. I ought never to have said yes. I ought to have cared more-ah, Frank, I have been selfish, and selfishness is sure to be punished.'

'Nonsense! What are you afraid of?' said Frank, gazing earnestly into her face. She shook her head, and looked down. Then she lifted her eyes again with a little air of proud resolution.

'I will tell you,' she said, 'and then you will be warned, perhaps, and go away. You ought to have known it all before; you have been deceived. We have all joined

in deceiving you. At first I did not think what I was doing, but now I know. Frank, I thought it would be easier to die than to tell you all the story; but now I will, for you are giving yourself ignorantly. And I will not have it; you are too dear and generous.'

Frank smiled as he listened and watched her face.

I think you are disturbing yourself about nothing, my dear child,' he said.

'Indeed I am not. Ah, you would not say that if you knew what pain it is to me, how all the old pain comes back! Only this is fifty thousand times worse, because I do believe-'

That you love me, and I love you.' Frank finished her speech for her. I should say that made it fifty thousand times better. It strikes me you don't quite understand the force of what you are saying. Under those circumstances is it likely that I should give you up, whatever you might have to tell me? Listen. You are like some princess in a fairy tale, who put all her lovers to death if they couldn't answer a certain question: What is my thought like? Don't you know? Well, lots of them came to an untimely end, but at last the right man came and answered it. He always does. Your question was different. You asked it me one morning as you went out of that door, and would not stop to hear the answer, because you knew it would be the right one. So altogether I don't see what there is to vex yourself about.'

Frank spoke very deliberately, with a cool reasoning air. A look of great surprise came into Marguérite's face; she flushed up as she had done that morning, which both she and Frank remembered so well.

You say very strange things,'