"We will talk somewhere else, monsieur le marquis," replied Cardonnet, "for I cannot stay here any longer: suppose we go down to the foot of the mountain?" "No, monsieur, no, permit me to insist: what I have to say is of some importance, and everybody here must hear it. It seems clear to me that I have not arrived soon enough to prevent some unpleasant explanations; but you are a man of affairs, Monsieur Cardonnet, and you know that it is the custom to summon a family council upon matters of serious importance at which momentous interests are discussed coolly, even when the participants bring to the council some little passion in the depths of their hearts. Monsieur le Comte de Châteaubrun, I beg you to detain Monsieur Cardonnet--it is quite essential. I am old and ill, I may not have the strength to come here again, to take such a journey. You are young men compared with me; I ask you therefore to be calm and considerate and to spare me much fatigue. Will you refuse me?" The marquis spoke this time with an ease and grace which made him an entirely different man from him whom Monsieur Cardonnet had seen an hour earlier. He was conscious of a feeling of curiosity, not unmixed with a prudent regard for his own interests. Monsieur de Châteaubrun requested him to remain, and they all returned to the pavilion, with the exception of Janille, to whom Monsieur Antoine made a sign, and who took her place behind the kitchen door to listen. Gilberte was uncertain whether she ought to go in or remain outside; but Monsieur de Boisguilbault offered her his hand with much courtesy, and, leading her to a chair, sat down near her, at some distance from her father and Emile's. "To proceed in order, and in accordance with the respect due to ladies," he began, "I will first address myself to Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun.--Mademoiselle, I made my will last night, and I have come here to inform you as to its provisions and conditions; but I should be glad not to be refused this time, and I shall not have the courage to read you this scrawl unless you will promise not to be angry. You also laid down certain conditions in a letter which I have here and which caused me much pain. However, I consider them just, and I understand your unwillingness to accept the most trivial gift from a man whom you consider your father's enemy. In order to prevail upon you, therefore, it is necessary that this hostility should come to an end, and that monsieur your father should forgive me for whatever wrong I may have done him.--Monsieur de Châteaubrun," he said, rising with heroic courage, "you injured me many years ago; I retaliated by withdrawing my friendship from you without any explanation. We should either have fought or forgiven each other. We did not fight, but for twenty years we have been strangers, which is a more serious matter to two men who have been much attached to each other. I forgive you the wrong you did me, will you forgive me?"