She had no time to temporize or to reflect; she wrote to him immediately, giving the letter in charge of a youth in the neighborhood.
“The gentleman says you may rely upon him,” said the messenger on his return.
That very evening Marie-Anne heard someone rap at her door. It was the kind-hearted old man who had come to her relief.
He remained at the Borderie nearly a fortnight.
When he departed one morning, before daybreak, he took away with him under his large cloak an infant—a boy—whom he had sworn to cherish as his own child.
CHAPTER XLII
To quit Sairmeuse without any display of violence had cost Blanche an almost superhuman effort.
The wildest anger convulsed her soul at the very moment, when, with an assumption of melancholy dignity, she murmured those words of forgiveness.
Ah! had she obeyed the dictates of her resentment!