"But, fortunately," thought David, "I am here with him."
When they had left the forest, Frederick took a road covered with turf, across the fallow ground, which, leaving the wood around Pont Brillant to the right, conducted him to the crest of a little hill where stood five or six isolated fir-trees.
"My dear child," said David, at the end of a few minutes, "I am so pleased with the words of affectionate confidence you addressed to me this morning, because they could not have come at a better time."
"Why is that, M. David?"
"Because, secure in this confidence and affection that I have tried to inspire in you up to this time, I will now be able to undertake a task which at first seemed very difficult."
"And what is this task?"
"To make you as happy as you were formerly."
"I!" exclaimed Frederick, involuntarily.
"Yes."
"But," replied Frederick, with self-repression, "I am no longer unhappy, I said so this morning to my mother; the malady that I suffered from, and which has embittered my feelings, has disappeared almost entirely. Besides, M. Dufour has told my mother that it is at an end."