"Oh, you dear little goose, of course not, it was only to-day that Henri and I confessed our love for each other. You have not seen me crying to-day, have you?"
"No, certainly not, but I want to know all about yesterday's trouble."
"What an inquisitive little girl it is," said Renée smiling.
"Do please tell me," pleaded Céleste, "I am dying to find out, and you know how faithfully I can keep a secret."
Céleste's curiosity amounted almost to a mania, and this fencing on the part of Renée made the young girl fairly boil over with eagerness to probe what seemed to her some dreadful mystery.
"So can I keep a secret," replied Renée, half sadly. "But please, chérie, do not ask me any more questions. I dare not tell. And, Céleste dearie, please, please, promise me that you will not tell anybody about my engagement. You cannot understand what terrible harm it might do me if it were known. It must be kept a dead secret at present, you do not know how much I have suffered, and how frightened I am sometimes of my life and Henri's. Oh dear, oh dear, it is really too dreadful," and she threw her arms around Céleste and sobbed again.
"Renée, ma mie, it is terrible to see you like this, what can the mystery be? I must know," and in her excitement she seized her sister's hands, and pulled the girl to her and shook her.
"No, Céleste dearest," sobbed Renée, "help me with your love and sympathy to bear it, but do not ask me any more. Hush, I hear someone coming, remember not a word to anyone," and she rushed off into her own room.
"H'm," muttered Céleste to herself as she heard Renée locking the door of her room, "there's a heap of trouble brewing somewhere in all this. The mystery seems to become more and more obscure. I shall die if I don't get to the bottom of it, I know I shall. Where can I find out all about it? Let me think. There's mamma, but she's too stupid to have noticed anything. Then there's papa, but he's far too secretive and cautious, he's of no use, he will only joke with me and turn the question; that is unless I humour him properly. That is the only way to deal with him. I certainly might get it out of him by kissing him and playing on his vanity. It is worth trying, anyhow. Then there's Delapine himself. He, of course, is sure to know. But then I am rather frightened of him, I confess. He stands on his dignity a little too much for my purpose. Let me see, now what about Marcel? He is more my style, but he has not taken much notice of me. When he is not planning some new creation in waistcoats, or neckties, or composing a poem, he is trying to say something witty. I suppose the things he says are really clever, although I don't understand a word of them. No, I can't very well confide in him."