"At the first stroke, I felt that convulsion experienced whenever Acharat approached me; a shock came to my heart; I saw him appear in the chapel doorway."
"Was it fright that you felt?" asked Count Fenix.
"No, no; it was joy, bliss, ecstasy, for I knew that he came to tear me from the desperate death which I so abhorred. Slowly he came up to my coffin; he smiled on me as he gazed for a moment, and he said:
'Are you glad to live? Then come with
me.'
"All the bonds snapped at his call; I rose, extricated myself from the bier as from the grave clothes, and passed by the slumbering nun. I followed him who for the second time had snatched me from death.
"Out in the courtyard I beheld the sky spangled with stars which never more had I expected to see. I felt that cool night air which blesses not the dead, but which is so refreshing to the
living.
"'Now,' said my liberator, 'before quitting the convent, choose between it and me. Will you be a nun, or will you be my wife?' I wanted to be his wife, and I followed him.