We had been there two or three hours. My mother was dancing and my aunt gossiping with the superannuated females who compose what is called in France the tapestry of a ball-room. Leoni was seated by my side and talking to me in an undertone with a passion of which every word kindled a spark in my blood. Suddenly his voice died on his lips; he became pale as death, as if he had seen a ghost. I followed the direction of his terrified glance and saw, a few steps away, a person the sight of whom was distasteful to myself: it was a young man named Henryet, who had made me an offer of marriage the year before. Although he was rich and of an honorable family, my mother had not deemed him worthy of me, and had dismissed him on the pretext of my extreme youth. But, at the beginning of the following year, he had renewed his offer with much persistence, and it had been currently reported in the city that he was madly in love with me. I had not deigned to take any notice of him, and my mother, who considered him too simple and too ordinary, had put an end to his assiduities rather abruptly. He had manifested more grief than anger, and had started immediately for Paris. Since then my aunt and my young friends had reproached me somewhat for my indifference with respect to him. He was, they said, a most excellent young man, thoroughly educated, and of a noble character. These reproaches had disgusted me. His unexpected appearance in the midst of the happiness I was enjoying with Leoni was most unpleasant to me, and had the effect upon me of a new reproof. I turned my face away and pretended not to have seen him, but the strange glance he bestowed upon me did not escape me. Leoni hastily grasped my arm, and asked me to come and take an ice in the next room; he added that the heat was distressing to him and made him nervous. I believed him, and thought that Henryet's glance expressed nothing more than jealousy. We went into the gallery. There were few people there, and I walked back and forth for some time, leaning on Leoni's arm. He was agitated and preoccupied. I manifested some uneasiness thereat, and he answered that it was not worth talking about; that he simply did not feel perfectly well. He was beginning to recover himself when I saw that Henryet had followed us. I could not help showing my annoyance. "Upon my word that man follows us like remorse," I whispered to Leoni. "Is it really a man? I can almost believe that it is a soul in distress returned from the other world." "What man?" said Leoni, with a start. "What's his name? where is he? what does he want of us? do you know him?" I told him in a few words what had happened, and begged him not to seem to notice Henryet's absurd actions. But Leoni did not reply; and I felt his hand, which held mine, become cold as death. A convulsive shudder passed through his body, and I thought that he was going to faint; but it was all over in an instant.