As the two talkers moved away, a certain movement might have been observed toward the middle of the room, and many and loud greetings welcomed a new comer, who seemed to have been long absent. Mysterious magnetism of the heart! Ferdinand knew what had happened, and was prepared, when he turned round, to recognize at last—standing in the midst of a group, who were pressing eagerly around her—the _one_, so long, so vainly sought; the vision that had risen over his ruin like a star over the tempest-torn sea, that had come and vanished in the momentous night, when it was proved to him that his sole resources, for a bare existence, must depend, in future, upon hard, ignoble, unavowed and insufficient toil! There she stood—bright, beautiful and glad, beaming on all about her; dispensing favors in look, gesture and smile, and inflicting wound after wound on Ferdinand’s heart by the incomparably sweet voice that, do what he would, seemed to his ear always to repeat—“_What a wretched, stupid play!—is it not?_” It was the only link between them—the one sole sign whereby she had acknowledged his existence. How long the _soirée_ lasted, was what M. de Candolles never knew; he simply thought it a time—it might be one protracted moment—during which there was light; then, the light went out, and darkness spread over every thing around. He would not ask to be presented to Mademoiselle de Vouvray; he was content to watch her; and, when she was gone, he mechanically closed his eyes, locked up his vision within his inmost self, and then, re-awakening, went forth, to be once more alone with his idea!