"Nothing, on my honour as a gentleman," replied Laurent earnestly. "He is very weak still, but that is all"—"save for mental torment," he added to himself, as Aymar, returning, announced that Eveno had gone off in search of his father, and that they could start.
It was soon blessedly plain to Laurent, as they drove along, that Mme de Villecresne had no intention of asking any awkward questions, either of or in front of L'Oiseleur. Whatever she had learnt in the cottage her love, at least, had suffered no hurt there. Despite her visible anxiety, there was a kind of submerged radiance about her which would have told anybody that. As for Aymar, he gave the impression of having been far away and of having incompletely returned. He said very little. But Laurent was not conscious, as he had expected, of being de trop in their company. The atmosphere of care and tenderness which Mme de Villecresne gradually diffused seemed to include him, too, and the perfectly unwarrantable bias which he cherished against her began to be shaken.
He could study her more at his leisure now. She had much the same colouring as Aymar, but otherwise the resemblance between them was not striking. Her hair, where the riding-hat showed it, was brighter than his, and her eyes were less unusual; they were grey . . . or violet? It was not till later that he noticed in her, too, that free and noble carriage of the head which was one of Aymar's most striking characteristics. But he did observe, as she talked to him, both the sweetness of her expression and the air of resolution which seemed somehow to reside in her little pointed chin.
They were at their journey's end before Laurent realized the fact, or had obtained that distant view of the château which he had promised himself. By that time Aymar's extreme fatigue was so impossible to disguise that his cousin decreed he should go straight to his room before seeing his grandmother, and she would present M. de Courtomer.
But these plans were disordered, directly they entered the hall, through the agency of the huge dog who first leapt upon his master with such an impact that he sent him staggering, and then set up so tremendous a paean of joy that the whole house seemed to reverberate with it. It was hardly surprising that, by the time quiet was restored, an old lady stood in a doorway, a little Dresden china image, saying, "Why has Sarrasin been allowed out of the stables? . . . Good God, is that—Aymar!"
L'Oiseleur dragged himself to kiss her hand. Laurent saw the delicate colour go completely from her face, and he guessed that nobody there existed for her at all in that moment save her grandson. She caught him by the wrist.
"Go up to your room at once!" she said with a catch of the breath. "Where is Anselme?"
"I have sent for him, Grand'mère," answered Mme de Villecresne. "Yes, Aymar is very tired."
"Tired!" ejaculated Mme de la Rocheterie.
"Is it not allowed, Grand'mère?" interposed Aymar with the best smile that he could muster. "However, I will go and rest a little, but first—Monsieur de Courtomer!"