These terrible words smote Elinor to the core. All the gaiety and fond hope that she had brought with her to the ball were gone now. She admitted the justice of the unexpected reproaches with which he had met her advances, and in her humiliation, her courage and her strength both deserted her. Léon saw that she could scarcely stand, and he led her to a bench away from the crowd, seating himself beside her. Fortunately, the pain she was enduring found relief in tears. "Ah, forgive me," said Léon, touched at the spectacle of her genuine grief, "forgive me, O you whom I cannot understand. I am angry now with myself for my misplaced harshness! Only, having received so many marks of your indifference, could I expect to find you vulnerable?" Then he pressed her to drop her mask, and allow him to see her home. At first she was tempted to comply, and to reveal the face that would instantly have disarmed him; but she dreaded a scene that might attract all eyes to them, and a wish to put him to one more proof restrained her. Drawing her hood down over her eyes, and disguising her voice more carefully than ever, she said sadly: "No, why take me home? The hour is late, and you have taught me circumspection. Why remove my mask? Of what use to know a woman you can no longer love? I can see why you are so cold. I know where you spent your convalescence, and whose hands nursed you." "Well, then, madame," said Léon, seriously, "you know also that my gratitude could not possibly be too warm, or my admiration too high. Yes, I do not deny it. In three months of the most endearing intimacy, tended by a woman whose beauty was the least of her charms, a woman sympathetic and reasonable, who unites the dignity proper to her sex with that kindness of heart that is an ornament the more--could I fail to appreciate so many lovable qualities? Could I ever forget her?" Elinor, beside herself with joy at his words, felt that if she stayed another moment she would betray herself in spite of her efforts. She rose at once. "Be happy then," she said. "Your happiness will be mine. I say no more about myself. I ask nothing; you are free. But would you care to see your daughter?" "Would I, indeed! You cannot doubt it!" "Then come and lunch with me tomorrow and you shall." She gave him her address, but without adding her name. "My people will know," she said. "They will show you in." She left, deeply affected by what had passed. "What would have become of me," she said to herself in terror, "what should I have done, if I had never had the opportunity of winning his esteem and his love in another aspect?" XII That night was spent by Léon in the greatest agitation.