"I quite agree with you," returned the count, with a sardonic look; "but, unfortunately, life and death are not in our hands!"
As he spoke, there was a gleam in his malignant eye, almost murderous. His foot was lifted to crush the worm in his path, and, could he have trodden it out of existence in secret, the deed would have been accomplished with exultation. His hatred for Madeleine had strengthened into a fierce passion as his fears that Maurice loved her threatened to be confirmed. Far from sharing his mother's indignation at the proposal of Count Damoreau, he had made up his mind to force Madeleine into acceptance, if no other presented itself for freeing the château from her presence.
CHAPTER VII.
A CRISIS.
Count Tristan was in the heat of argument with his haughty mother, when the door of the library opened, and Madeleine entered. One who had beheld the tempestuous burst of grief, the torrent of tears, the heart-rending despair that convulsed her frame but half an hour before, in the little châlet, would scarcely have recognized the countenance upon which the eyes of the Countess de Gramont and her son were now turned. Not the faintest shadow of that whirlwind of passionate anguish was left upon Madeleine's face, unless it might be traced in the great calm which succeeds a heavy storm; in the death-like pallor which overspread her almost rigid features; in the steady light that shone from her soul-revealing eyes; in the firm outline of her colorless lips; in the look of heroic resolve which imparted to her noble lineaments a higher beauty than they ever before had worn.
She approached Count Tristan with an unfaltering step, holding a letter in her hand. That letter had given a sudden check to her vehement sorrow, and restored her equilibrium.
"I have received this communication from Count Damoreau."
As she spoke, she extended the epistle to the count, who for one instant quailed before her clairvoyant eyes. It seemed as though a prophetic judgment spoke out of their shining depths.
He took the letter mechanically, without opening it. His gaze was riveted, as though by a magnetism too powerful for him to resist, upon her purposeful countenance.