"Of more importance than I can explain to you!"
"Oh, then let us stay, aunt! We must make allowances for Madame de Fleury's ruling passion. Her toilet first, all the world afterward!"
A carriage just then drove to the door, and attracted the attention of Bertha, who was standing by the open window.
"What magnificent horses! and what a neat equipage! All the appointments in such admirable taste! A lady is descending. I suppose it must be the Countess Orlowski. What a dignified air she has! What a graceful bearing! I wish I could see her face. She must be handsome with such a perfect figure. Yes,—I am right,—it is the Countess Orlowski, for the servant has admitted her."
As the lady was passing through the hall, she said to the domestic, "No, you need not announce me; I will go at once to the chamber of Madame de Fleury."
At the sound of that voice, the shriek of joy that broke from Bertha's lips drowned the amazed exclamation of Maurice. In another instant, Bertha's arms were around the stranger, and her kisses were mingled with tears and broken ejaculations, as she embraced her rapturously.
Maurice stood beside them, struggling with emotion that caused his manly frame to vibrate from head to foot, while his dilated eyes appeared spellbound by some familiar apparition which they hardly dared to believe was palpable.
There is a joy which, in its wild excess, paralyzes the faculties, makes dumb the voice, confuses the brain, until ecstasy becomes agony, and all the senses are enveloped in a cloud of doubt. Such was the joy of Maurice as he stood powerless, questioning the blissful reality of the hour, yet in the actual presence of that being who was never a moment absent from his mental vision.
"Madeleine! Madeleine! My own Madeleine! Have we found you at last? Is it really you?" sobbed Bertha, whose tears always flowed easily, but now poured in torrents from their blue heavens.
And Madeleine, as she passionately returned her cousin's embrace, dropped her head upon Bertha's shoulder, and wept also.