"Nay, my lord, we do but mutually requite our several obligations. You preserved to me my father, and Heaven permits me to restore your daughter at a time you bewailed her as lost. But I, too, must beg to be excused for the weakness which resists all my endeavours to control it; the sudden and unexpected news you have communicated to me has quite overcome me, and I confess I should not have sufficient command over myself to go in quest of Fleur-de-Marie,--my emotion would terrify her." "And by what means was she preserved?" exclaimed Rodolph; "and whose hand snatched her from death? I am most ungrateful not to have put these questions to you earlier." "She was rescued from drowning by a courageous female, who snatched her from a watery grave just as she was sinking." "Do you know who this female was?" "I do; and to-morrow she will be at my house." "The debt is immense!" rejoined the prince; "but I will endeavour to repay it." "Heaven must have inspired me with the idea of leaving Fleur-de-Marie in the carriage," said the marquise. "Had I brought her in with me the shock must have killed her." "Now, then," said the prince, who had been for some minutes occupied in endeavouring to subdue his extreme agitation, "I can promise you, my kind friends, that I have my feelings sufficiently under control to venture to meet my--my--daughter. Go, Murphy, and fetch her to my longing arms." Rodolph pronounced the word daughter with a tenderness of voice and manner impossible to describe. "Are you quite sure you are equal to the trying scene, my lord?" inquired Clemence; "for we must run no risks with one in Fleur-de-Marie's delicate state." "Oh, yes,--yes! Be under no alarm! I am too well aware of the dangerous consequences any undue emotion would occasion my child; be assured I will not expose her to anything of the sort. But go--go--my good Murphy; I beseech you hasten to bring her hither." "Don't be alarmed, madame," said the squire, who had attentively scrutinised the countenance of the prince; "she may come now without danger. I am quite sure that his royal highness will sufficiently command himself." "Then go--go--my faithful friend; you are keeping me in torments." "Just give me one minute, my lord," said the excellent creature, drying the moisture from his eyes; "I must not let the poor thing see I have been crying. There, there--that will do! I should not like to cross the antechamber looking like a weeping Magdalen." So saying, the squire proceeded towards the door, but suddenly turning back, he said, "But, my lord, what am I to say to her?" "Yes, what had he better say?" inquired the prince of Clemence. "That M. Rodolph wishes to see her,--nothing more."