Part 14

“But then,” said Rosalie, “why meet at night?”

Mariette was dumfounded, and could make no reply.

“Listen, Mariette; I am in love too! In secret and without any return. I am, after all, my father’s and mother’s only child. You have more to hope for from me than from any one else in the world--”

“Certainly, mademoiselle, and you may count on us for life or death,” exclaimed Mariette, rejoiced at the unexpected turn of affairs.

“In the first place, silence for silence,” said Rosalie. “I will not marry Monsieur de Soulas; but one thing I will have, and must have; my help and favor are yours on one condition only.”

“What is that?”

“I must see the letters which Monsieur Savaron sends to the post by Jerome.”

“But what for?” said Mariette in alarm.

“Oh! merely to read them, and you yourself shall post them afterwards. It will cause a little delay; that is all.”

At this moment they went into church, and each of them, instead of reading the order of Mass, fell into her own train of thought.

“Dear, dear, how many sins are there in all that?” thought Mariette.

Rosalie, whose soul, brain, and heart were completely upset by reading the story, by this time regarded it as history, written for her rival. By dint of thinking of nothing else, like a child, she ended by believing that the Eastern Review was no doubt forwarded to Albert’s lady-love.

“Oh!” said she to herself, her head buried in her hands in the attitude of a person lost in prayer; “oh! how can I get my father to look through the list of people to whom the Review is sent?”

After breakfast she took a turn in the garden with her father, coaxing and cajoling him, and brought him to the kiosk.

“Do you suppose, my dear little papa, that our Review is ever read abroad?”

“It is but just started--”

“Well, I will wager that it is.”

“It is hardly possible.”

“Just go and find out, and note the names of any subscribers out of France.”

Two hours later Monsieur de Watteville said to his daughter:

“I was right; there is not one foreign subscriber as yet. They hope to get some at Neufchatel, at Berne, and at Geneva. One copy, is in fact, sent to Italy, but it is not paid for--to a Milanese lady at her country house at Belgirate, on Lago Maggiore.

“What is her name?”

“The Duchesse d’Argaiolo.”

“Do you know her, papa?”

“I have heard about her. She was by birth a Princess Soderini, a Florentine, a very great lady, and quite as rich as her husband, who has one of the largest fortunes in Lombardy. Their villa on the Lago Maggiore is one of the sights of Italy.”

Two days after, Mariette placed the following letter in Mademoiselle de Watteville’s hand:--

Albert Savaron to Leopold Hannequin.

“Yes, ‘tis so, my dear friend; I am at Besancon, while you thought I was traveling. I would not tell you anything till success should begin, and now it is dawning. Yes, my dear Leopold, after so many abortive undertakings, over which I have shed the best of my blood, have wasted so many efforts, spent so much courage, I have made up my mind to do as you have done--to start on a beaten path, on the highroad, as the longest but the safest. I can see you jump with surprise in your lawyer’s chair!