"Indeed, indeed," cried Agnes, who seemed to feel some reproach in his words, "I did not intend to grieve him more than I could help in telling him the truth. But how could I love him?" she asked, with a bewildered look; and then shaking her head sadly, she added, "no--no!"
"Not a word more, dear Agnes," answered Jean Charost. "You did right to tell him the truth; and I am quite sure you did it as gently as might be. Now let us forget this painful incident as soon as we can, and all be as we were before."
"Oh gladly," cried Agnes, with a bright smile. "I hope for nothing, I desire nothing but that."
He soothed her with kindly tenderness, and soon whiled her away from all painful thoughts, gradually and with more skill than might have been expected, leading the conversation by imperceptible degrees to other subjects and to distant scenes. The return of Madame De Brecy to the room renewed for a time the beautiful girl's agitation; and Jean Charost left her with his mother, with a promise to take a long ramble with her that evening, and make her show him every fair spot in the woods around the castle.
Woman's heart, it is generally supposed, is more easily opened to a fellow-woman than to a man; and sometimes it is so, but sometimes not. If we have watched closely, most of us must have seen the secret within more carefully guarded from a woman's eyes than from any other--perhaps from a knowledge of their acuteness. Such, indeed, might not--probably was not.--the case with Agnes. Nevertheless, it was in vain that Madame De Brecy questioned her. She told all that had occurred frankly and simply, every word that had been uttered, as far as she could recollect them. But there was something that Agnes did not tell--the cause of all that had occurred. True, she could not tell it; for it was intangible to herself--misty, indefinite--a something which she could feel, but not explain. Gladly she heard the trumpet sound to dinner; for she had set Madame De Brecy musing; and Agnes did not like that she should muse too long over her conduct of that day.
Noon proved very sultry, and Jean Charost had plenty of occupation for several hours after the meal. Horsemen came and went: he saw several persons from Bourges, and several of the tenants of St. Florent. He sent off a large body of the men who had accompanied him from Poictiers to the neighboring city, and the castle resumed an air of silence and loneliness.
Toward evening, however, he called upon Agnes to prepare for her walk; and as he paced up and down the hall waiting for her, Madame De Brecy judged from his look and manner that he meditated speaking to his fair charge, that very evening, on the delicate subject of her own history.
"Be gentle with the dear girl, my son," she said, "and if you see that a subject agitates her, change it. There is something on Agnes's mind that we do not comprehend fully; and one may touch a tender point without knowing it."
"Do you suspect any other attachment?" asked Jean Charost, turning so suddenly, and speaking so gravely, that his mother was surprised.
"None whatever," she answered. "Indeed, I can not believe such a thing possible. To my knowledge she has seen no one at all likely to gain her affections but this Monsieur De Brives. The stiff old soldiers left to guard this castle and De Brecy, good Martin Grille, and Henriot, the groom, upon my word, are the only men we have seen."