Her lively imagination exaggerated sympathy and antipathy, and she often received the wise and reasonable suggestions of Honorât with mischievous irony and even resentment.
Legend and romance were the mental food she craved, and often in thought she pictured herself as the heroine of some strange adventure. Honorât would dissipate these fantastic visions by a breath, and not infrequently reproached Reine, with as much good-humour as gaiety, for these vagabond imaginations.
But these little differences were soon forgotten. Reine would confess her wrong-doing with adorable frankness, and the beautiful affection of the two lovers seemed only to increase.
Unconsciously, Reine began to feel the influence of Honorât more and more in her daily life, and instead of indulging herself in vague reveries and foolish imaginations, occupied her mind with graver thoughts. She recognised the nothingness of her former dreams, and every step of this wise and happy way served to establish her love for Chevalier de Berrol.
Her mind and character had undergone such a complete transformation under the influence of Honorât, that her father, sometimes, when he had gone beyond the limits of temperance, would say in jest that Reine was becoming insupportably serious.
The sentiment of Reine for Honorât was by no means a passionate love, nourished by difficulties and uncertainties, but a calm, sincere, and reasonable affection, in which the young girl recognised, with a sort of tender veneration, the superior reason of her betrothed.
Such were the sentiments of Mlle, des Anbiez when the fatal meeting in the rocks of Ollioules took place.
The first time that she saw Erebus, placed her under the influence of a profound sentiment of gratitude; he had just saved the baron’s life.
Reine, perhaps, might never have observed the surprising beauty of the stranger, but for the startling circumstances by which he was presented to her.
The fact that he had just delivered her father from a frightful danger was the most powerful fascination that Erebus could offer.