"Thank God!" exclaimed Louis, resisting Madame Lacombe's efforts, and again bending over Mariette; "she is moving a little. See! her hands are relaxing; her eyelids are quivering. Mariette, darling, can't you hear me? It is Louis who speaks to you." The girl was, in fact, gradually recovering consciousness, and her tear-stained eyes, after having slowly opened and wandered aimlessly around for a moment, fixed themselves upon Louis. Soon, an expression of joyful surprise irradiated her features, and she murmured, faintly: "Louis, is it really you? Ah, I never expected--" Then, the sad reality gradually forcing itself upon her mind, she averted her face, and, letting her head again fall upon Madame Lacombe's bosom, she said, with a deep sigh: "Ah, godmother, it is for the last time! All is over between us!" "Didn't I tell you how it would be?" exclaimed Madame Lacombe. "Go, I tell you, go! Oh, the misery of being so weak and infirm that one cannot turn a scoundrel out of one's house!" "Mariette," cried Louis, imploringly, "Mariette, in pity, listen to me. I do not come to bid you farewell; on the contrary, I come to tell you that I love you better than ever!" "Good God!" exclaimed the young girl, starting up as if she had received an electric shock; "what does he say?" "I say that we are both the victims of a terrible mistake, Mariette. I have never for one moment ceased to love you, no, never! and all the time I have been away I have had but one thought and desire,--to see you again and make all the necessary arrangements for our speedy marriage, as I told you in my letter." "Your letter!" exclaimed Mariette, in heart-broken tones, "he has forgotten. Here, Louis, here is your letter." And, as she spoke, she handed the young man the crumpled, tear-blurred fragments of the letter. "He will deny his own writing, see if he don't," muttered Madame Lacombe, as Louis hastily put the torn pieces together. "And you will be fool enough to believe him." "This is what I wrote, Mariette," said Louis, after he had put the letter together: * * * * * "'MY DEAREST MARIETTE:--I shall be with you again the day after you receive this letter. The short absence, from which I have suffered so much, has convinced me that it is impossible for me to live separated from you. Thank God! the day of our union is near at hand. To-morrow will be the sixth of May, and as soon as I return I shall tell my father of our intentions, and I do not doubt his consent. "'Farewell, then, until day after to-morrow, my beloved Mariette. I love you madly, or rather wisely, for what greater wisdom could a man show than in having sought and found happiness in a love like yours. "'Yours devotedly, LOUIS. "'I write only these few lines because I shall reach Paris almost as soon as my letter, and because it is always painful to me to think that another must read what I write to you. But for that, how many things I would say to you.