"That didn't prevent her coming here when she wanted to find out who had had the audacity to fight with her count. She was sure it was Monsieur Gustave. But you told her she was mistaken, and you were right. Why should Monsieur Gustave fight for her, I should like to know, when she keeps making sport of him? A man doesn't fight, except for a person he loves; and I am very sure, for my part, that Monsieur Gustave never gives your sister a thought now." "You think not, Madeleine?" This question was asked with an eagerness which would have betrayed Adolphine's secret, if her maid had not already guessed it. "But Fanny isn't married!" murmured Adolphine sadly, a moment later. "Well, mamzelle, for my part, I am glad of it! She'd have kicked up altogether too much dust if she had been a countess." "But when will Gustave come back?" "Why, you don't suppose that he will still want to marry your sister, do you?" "Why not? He loved her so much!" "Well, I'll bet that he won't. Think of it, mamzelle, after two such affronts as that! for you told me it was the second time she had broken with him. Why, he would have to be a downright fool for that. Is Monsieur Gustave a fool?" "Oh, no! far from it." "Well, then----" At that moment the bell rang; Adolphine started, without knowing why, and Madeleine cried: "There, suppose it was him? Speak of the devil----" It was, in fact, Gustave, and Madeleine's face was wreathed in smiles when she announced him to her mistress. The young man entered with more or less embarrassment, caused by Cherami's disclosures. But Adolphine held out her hand, and he pressed it in his with such force that the girl was deeply moved; for Gustave had never manifested so much pleasure at sight of her. In a moment she spied the scar, and exclaimed in dismay: "Mon Dieu! Monsieur Gustave, you are wounded!" "No; it is all healed." "But you surely have been terribly wounded. What was it?" "A sword-cut." "You have had a duel?" "Yes, with an Irish officer. I was in London then." "And why? For--whom did you fight?" "Oh! it was for a mere trifle. A quarrel following a hearty breakfast." "Mon Dieu! if you had been killed!" "I shouldn't be with you now." "Was the wound serious?" "Yes, it kept me housed six weeks. But for that, I should have been at home more than a month ago." "More than a month! Ah! then you were anxious to return at once as soon as you learned--what had happened?" "What do you mean?" "Why, the thing that caused--oh! surely you know?" "No, I do not know. I intended to return, because I had finished my uncle's business, because I was horribly bored in England, and because I had no reason for staying away from Paris any longer." "Was that all?" "To be sure. What other reason are you thinking of, pray?" "Don't you know that the Comte de la Beriniere is dead?" "Certainly I know it." "And that he died before he had married my sister?" "I know all that."