The general and his grandson had met but for a few moments in the twenty-four hours following their decisive interview, and these moments had been painful enough. At present the young man had gone to his friend Clermont's, determined to prove to his mother and grandfather that he was no longer a boy to be disposed of according to their pleasure. He found Héloïse alone, and informed her of all that had taken place on the previous day, the passionate agitation of his manner showing how profoundly he had been moved. "The die is cast," he concluded. "My betrothal with Hertha is at an end. I am as free as you are, and there is no longer any reason for concealment. Tell me at last, Héloïse, that you consent to be mine, to bear my name. You have never yet really done so." Héloïse had listened in silence, and with a slight frown. It seemed almost as if this turn of affairs were an unwelcome one to her. "Stay! not so fast, Raoul!" she said, in reply to his ardent words. "You acknowledge that your grandfather never will consent to our union, and you are entirely dependent upon him." "For the moment. But I am his heir-at-law; nothing can affect that, as you know." Héloïse was quite aware of it, but she was also aware of how little the income to which the young Count would fall heir would comport with her requirements. The matter had been the subject of an exhaustive discussion, but a little while previously, between herself and her brother, and the picture that Henri had then so ruthlessly drawn, of the dull life of a retired provincial town, had little in it to allure a woman to whom luxury and splendour were as her vital air. "Then let us hope for the future," she said. "The present is hostile enough to us. Not only your family dissensions, but political events threaten to part us." "Part us? And wherefore?" "Why, you must see that we cannot stay here if the war, which Henri thinks unavoidable, should really be declared. As soon as our ambassador leaves the capital we must go too. Henri tells me to be ready for a hasty departure." "Then let Henri go, but stay yourself. I cannot let you go. I know that I ask a sacrifice of you, but remember what I have sacrificed for your sake. To lose you now would be too horrible! You must stay!" "What should I stay for?" she asked, sternly. "To look on while the general carries out his threat, and sends you in full uniform to fight against France?" Raoul clinched his fist. "Héloïse, do not you too drive me to desperation. If you knew all that I have had, and yet have, to bear! My grandfather has scarcely spoken to me since yesterday, but his eyes, when he looks at me, make my blood boil, they are so full of scorn. My mother, from whom I have hitherto never known anything save love and tenderness, reproaches me bitterly. And now you talk of our parting, and I must brave it all alone. It is beyond endurance."