And she hastened away from Oswald, down the wall, across the lawn, into the salon, where they were dancing merrily. Cloten, who had in vain looked for her everywhere, and now stood melancholy, leaning against a door-frame, saw her at once and hurried to meet her.
"Why, Miss Emily! Caused me real anguish! Upon my word, was au désespoir! Thought, in fact, one of the heavenly ones had eloped with you."
"I have been quietly reflecting. Baron Cloten, on what you told me a little while ago," replied Emily.
"'Pon my word! Are an angel! and I may hope?" asked Cloten, who of course interpreted the reddened eyelids and the excited manner of the young girl in his own favor.
"Go to my aunt!"
"Really? 'pon honor? I can't believe it!" exclaimed the young man, and his surprise was by no means fictitious.
"Then do not go!" replied Miss Emily, in a tone which would have made anybody else very much afraid about the firmness of the tie that was about to be formed here.
"Great God! Emily, angel, do not be angry. I hasten, I fly----"
And Baron Cloten went away in most abject confusion to seek out the aunt.
Emily remained standing on the same spot, pale, her arms folded, her eyes fixed upon the groups of dancers, without seeing anything more than if she had stared into vacancy.