Offended by the whole tone of her manner, I bowed, and moved towards the door.
“Have you seen M. Marsac? I hear he has arrived.”
“No, Mademoiselle; not yet.”
“When you have conferred and consulted with him, your instructions are all prepared; and I suppose you are ready to start?”
“I shall be, Mademoiselle, when called upon.”
“I will say good-bye, then,” said she, advancing one step towards me, evidently intending to offer me her hand; but I replied by a low, very low bow, and retired.
I thought I should choke as I went down the stairs. My throat seemed to swell, and then to close up; and when I gained the shelter of the thick trees, I threw myself down on my face in the grass, and sobbed as if my heart was breaking. How I vowed and swore that I would tear every recollection of her from my mind, and never think more of her, and how her image ever came back clearer and brighter and more beautiful before me after each oath!
CHAPTER XXIII. THE MAN WHO TRAVELLED FOR OUR HOUSE
As I sat brooding over my fire that same evening, my door was suddenly opened, and a large burly man, looming even larger from an immense fur pelisse that he wore, entered. His first care was to divest himself of a tall Astracan cap, from which he flung off some snow-flakes, and then to throw off his pelisse, stamping the snow from his great boots, which reached half-way up the thigh.