"Monsieur le Baron is so angry that he will not listen to reason. It is easy for him to see this lady."
"Not I!" cried Henri; "I will see her no more."
"But what if you suspect her unjustly?"
"Then why was I deceived and told that she was dead? She was 'dead to me,' that is the explanation. She is not dead to others—to you, for instance, her new lover—oh Lord, Michel, a pretty messenger thou hast been!"
"A worse than the Baron supposes," Michel laughed nervously, "for his message was never delivered."
"What! though you believed me dead? Then indeed, my friend, you have been little better than a traitor."
"It seems you are determined to quarrel with me, say what I will; if I delivered the message it was in order to found a courtship of my own upon it; if I did not I am a traitor. Nevertheless I will not quarrel, my friend. It was not I that deceived you, remember, but I that undeceived you. Was it not Monsieur Dupré who declared that his daughter was dead? Then why am I to be quarrelled with?"
"Because, my friend, I believe you to have been a party to the deception, for a certain end of your own which I have indicated."
"Then your wrath is expended upon wind, for I swear to you that though, I confess, this lady is more to me than any woman in the world——"
"Aha! listen to him!" Henri raved.