The turmoil of her thoughts held her as by a spell; in the disruption of a fixed conclusion her brain was filled with new and poignant reflections. Unconsciously she placed a nervous hand upon his arm.
“Then Ernest Saint-Prosper who was––killed in Mexico was not the traitor?”
“Certainly not!” exclaimed Culver, quickly, “Owing to the disgrace, I am sure, more than to any other reason, he bade farewell to his country––and now lies unmourned in some mountain ravine. It is true the marquis quarreled with him, disliking not a little the young man’s republican ideas, but––my dear young lady!––you are ill?”
“No, no!” she returned, hastily, striving to maintain her self-possession. “How––do you know this?”
“Through the marquis, himself,” he replied, somewhat uneasy beneath her steady gaze. “He told me the story in order to protect the estate from any possible pretensions on the part of the traitor. The renegade was reported dead, but the marquis, nevertheless remained skeptical. He did not believe in the old saw about the devil being dead. ‘Le diable lives always,’ he said.”
The visitor observed a perceptible change in the young girl, just what he could not define, but to him it seemed mostly to lie in her eyes where something that baffled him looked out and met his glance.
“His brother was an officer in the French army?” she asked, as though forcing herself to speak.
“Yes; ten years older than Ernest Saint-Prosper, he had already made a career for himself. How eagerly, then, must the younger brother have looked forward to meeting him; to serving with one who, in his young eyes, was all that was brave and noble! 435 What a bitter awakening from the dream! It is not those we hate who can injure us most––only those we love can stab us so deeply!”
Mechanically she answered the lawyer, and, when he prepared to leave, the hand, given him at parting, was as cold as ice.