Hurriedly, almost despairingly, he concluded: "With the result that I have received the information, corroborated by these documents, that the girl's father has served a twenty months' sentence at hard labor in Alstadt, Silesia, having been convicted as a counterfeiter and incendiary."
"What more?" demanded the girl.
"O Amélie, is not that enough?"
"Enough, indeed," she answered, wrenching away her hands. "Farewell, Monsieur Marquis de Brezé. We have exchanged our last words." And she sped into the house before he could detain her.
[Chapter II]
MEMORIES
The Marquis remained at the grating, hoping that Amélie would return. When night closed in and she showed no signs of relenting, he wandered aimlessly through the streets, walking slowly, abstractedly, his mind absorbed with the beautiful imperious girl he so loved and between whom and himself had been thrust the proofs of her father's felony. He became oblivious of even the need of food, though he had eaten nothing since reaching England and putting up at the Hotel Douglas, a fourth-class tavern selected with the object of concealment from chance compatriots.
His wanderings conducted him back to the Thames, from whose turbid surface towered the masts of many vessels as they rocked at their moorings, His eyes rested vacantly on the waters, spangled with reflections of the stars overhead, as he recalled the history of his passion for this unknown woman and his first meeting with her in the home of Elois Adhemar, the miller on the de Brezé estate.
René had been in the habit of stopping for a glass of beer or warm milk at the mill, on returning from hunts on his fertile and extensive domains, and sundry pretty gallantries did he whisper into the ear of his host's winsome daughter, Geneviève—village beauty and rustic coquette—with a deep bosom and gleaming teeth.