"Go, Maurice," said Mrs. Walton, "and bring us the happy news that Ronald and his mother have not caused you fresh suffering."
"You said you had not a doubt," cried Maurice, trembling at the bare suggestion.
"And I have not. Go!"
CHAPTER LII.
A LOVER'S SNARE.
Maurice was on his way to Madeleine's. Not for years, not since the day when he breathed his love in the old Château de Gramont, had his heart throbbed with such rapturous pulsations as now; not since that hour had the world looked so paradisiacal,—life so full of enchantment to his eyes. As he reached her door and ascended the steps, his emotions were overpowering. A few moments more, and the heavenly dream would become a glorious, life-brightening reality, or would melt away, a delusive mirage in the desert of his existence, leaving his pathway a blanker wilderness than ever.
He was too much at home to require the ceremony of announcement, and sought Madeleine in her boudoir. She was not there. She was receiving visitors in the drawing-room. Maurice sat down to await her coming; but his impatience made him too restless for inaction, and he entered the salon.
Madeleine's guests were Madame de Fleury and Mrs. Gilmer,—an accidental and not very welcome encounter of the fashionable belligerents; though since Mrs. Gilmer had received the much-desired invitation to Madame de Fleury's ball, she had affected to lay down her arms, and Madame de Fleury pretended to do the same.