"Monsieur de Mauluçon," he said, "whose affection, it appears, you have won, has done me the honour of asking for your hand. I gave him to understand that you alone would dispose of it. He will be here to-morrow afternoon to confer with you. I do not know if he pleases you, but this I know, that if you wish to accept his offer you must lay before him the story of your past. And I need not tell you that if, after this, he persists in making you his wife, you can rely on my consent." "It shall be as you wish, father," Clarisse answered. That open nature, which was her most touching trait, made her father's attitude seem quite natural. She did not wait to think that Monsieur de Pontivy could have spared her the shame of this avowal by making it himself, for the fault of another is more easily confessed than our own. Clarisse only felt that, having inflicted a wrong on her father, she was in duty bound to expiate it. And, in truth, it did not cost her so much to make the confession to Monsieur de Mauluçon as it would to have broken it to any other, for he had from the first inspired her with unbounded confidence. She had read a manly generosity in the kindly expression of his frank, open face. She would never have dreamt of becoming his wife, but since he had offered himself why not accept the proffered support of so strong an arm? She well knew in her lonely existence that her father would never be the loving friend and protector that, in the utter weakness of her betrayed and blighted womanhood, she had yearned for through so many long days! But her child, her little Olivier, would he be an obstacle? At the thought her eyes filled with tears. What did it matter? She would only love him the more, the angel, and suffering would but bind them closer together! However, it was now to be decided, and both their destinies would be sealed, for she well knew that if Monsieur de Mauluçon drew back after her confession, all prospects of marriage would be over, for never again could she so humiliate herself, though she could bring herself to it now, for she had read a deep and tender sympathy in her lover's eyes. And, after all, what mattered it if she were not his wife? She would at least remain worthy of his pity, for he could not despise her. Her confession would create a tie between them which he would perhaps remember later on, when her little Olivier engaged in the battle of life. When Monsieur de Mauluçon came again to her, innocent of all suspicion, he found her grave and deeply moved. In a few brief words she laid bare to him the history of her past, and he was too high-souled, too strong and generous, to feel anything but an immense pity for a heart of exquisite sensibility, wrecked by its own confiding impulses, misunderstood, misled, and then forsaken. He took both her hands in his and pressed them to his lips respectfully. "And the child," he said; "whose name does he bear?"