"You do not know it," answered Hermione very firmly, "and you must not suggest it to me. Sometimes I could almost think you were really mad, aunt Annie,—forgive me, I must say it. Not mad as you pretended to be, but mad on this one point. You have always hated poor Paul since he was a child, and you have treated him very unkindly. But you have no right to accuse him now, and I would not listen to you unless I believed that I could help to make you see him as you should."
Madame Patoff bent her head and hid her eyes in her hand, as though greatly distressed.
"I love you so much, dear Hermy—I cannot bear to think of your marrying him. You cannot understand me—I know—and you think me very unkind. But I hate him!" she cried, with a burst of uncontrollable anger. "Oh, how I hate him!"
Her hands had dropped from her face, and her dark eyes flashed wickedly as she stared at the young girl. Hermione was startled for a moment, but she also had learned a lesson of self-possession.
"Do you think that I am afraid when you look at me like that, aunt Annie?" she asked, very quietly.
Madame Patoff's features relaxed, and she laughed a little foolishly, as though ashamed of herself.
"No, child; why should you be afraid? I am only an unhappy old woman. I cannot speak to any one else."
"And you must not speak to me in that way," answered Hermione, in a gentle tone. "I love Paul with all my heart, and I cannot hear him abused by you, even though I know you are out of your mind when you say such things. I should be despicable if I listened to you."
"If I loved you less, dear," returned the old lady, "I might hate him less. Ah, if you could only have married Alexis,—if it could only have been the other way!"
"Hush!" exclaimed Hermione, almost roughly. "You are wishing that Paul were dead, instead of his brother. I will go away, if you talk like that."