"My mistress also said that your father had rendered a service to her husband, the late Marquis, during the exile, giving that as the motive for your having been received in the castle. 'I wish now to further befriend the girl,' said she, 'by giving her a good husband. Are you ready to marry her? I will give her a dot of 75,000 francs,' But Mademoiselle, I agreed not because of the dot or the farm,--God confound me if I lie--but because I love you. Since you came, I have not slept a single night. If I closed my eyes I dreamed of you. I was like one bewitched." And he knelt at her feet, sobbing like a little child. She was moved to pity and said: "Jean, I see that you are a victim of the serpent also. Listen to the truth. I have married you because I was forced to, brutally forced. They were starving,--_starving_ to death--do you hear?--that little child, who is no child of mine.' Our marriage is a sacrilege in the eyes of God. By considering yourself my husband, you damn your own soul. Jean, beware of what you do!" He rose and folded his arms across his breast. "What you say may be true, Mademoiselle, and it hurts me to believe my mistress guilty of such conduct. But be the cause what it may, we are married. I am your husband; you are my wife; no power in heaven or earth can separate us. Whether the child is yours or not, matters little to me. Your life before I knew you concerns me not; I ask no questions. From today you are mine. Today you have been born anew, purer than water that falls from the clouds. I should defend you and the child to the death--I love you so much. You shall never again suffer, for now you belong to me. O if my mistress had not come to marry us, I should have killed you. You are holy to me, but my love is terrible. At last you are mine! O happiness!" The Breton flung his arms around her. Chapter VII DEATH Amélie sprang back, preparing for the struggle which the strength of the bridegroom would have rendered futile. The enameled clock rang out the hour of seven. The mythologically wrought panel opened again and a man entered. Jean loosed his hold and stood petrified. The man advanced and asked in a terrible voice: "What does this mean? What is going on in my house?" "René!" cried Amélie, running to her lover who clasped her in his arms, regardless of the fire in Jean's eyes. "Jean Vilon," said the master, "render an account of yourself. What has taken place in this castle? Unfaithful servant, how have you guarded this trust?" Vilon trembled and knelt before René. "Your lordship," he stammered, "your mother--the orders she brought me--from you." "Orders? Were they not to refuse entrance to anyone not giving the watch-word? Did my mother speak it, imbecile? Do I call you imbecile? I mean scoundrel. How have you treated this woman,--this woman who should be as holy to you as the Virgin?"