“Maxime, you must pardon me a very innocent deception, which was suggested by your own words. It is not I who am in love with Miss Sarah Brandon.”
Brevan was so much surprised, he could not stir.
“Who is it, then?” he asked.
“One of my friends.”
“What name?”
“I wish you would render the service I ask of you doubly valuable by not asking me that question,—at least, not to-day.”
Daniel spoke with such an accent of truth, that not a shadow of doubt remained on Maxime’s mind. It was not Daniel who had fallen in love with Sarah Brandon. Brevan did not doubt that for a moment. But he could not conceal his trouble, and his disappointment even, as he exclaimed,—
“Well done, Daniel! Tell me that your ingenuous people cannot deceive anybody!”
However, he said nothing more about it; and, while Daniel was pouring out his excuses, he quietly went back to the fire, and sat down. After a moment’s silence, he began again,—
“Let us assume, then, that it is one of your friends who is bewitched?”