"Thanks, thanks, a thousand thanks, Lenora!" exclaimed Gustave, in a transport. "Thy tender love strengthens me against destiny. Beloved of my heart, rest here under the guardian eye of God. Thy image will follow me in my journey like a protecting angel; in joy and grief, by day and night, in health and sickness, thou, Lenora, wilt ever be present to me! This cruel separation wounds my heart beyond expression; but duty commands, and I must obey. Farewell, farewell!"
He wrung her hands convulsively, and was gone.
"Gustave!" sobbed the poor girl, as she sank on the chair and allowed the pent-up passion of her soul to burst forth in tears.
CHAPTER VII.
Leonora secretly cherished in her heart the hope of a happy future; but she did not hesitate to inform her father of Gustave's visit. De Vlierbeck heard her listlessly, and gave no other reply but a bitter smile.
From that day Grinselhof became sadder and more solitary than ever. The old gentleman might generally be seen seated in an arm-chair, resting his forehead on his hand, while his eyes were fixed on the ground or on vacancy. The fatal day on which the bond fell due was perhaps always present to his mind; nor could he banish the thought of that frightful misery into which it would plunge his child and himself. Lenora carefully concealed her own sufferings in order not to increase her father's grief; and, although she fully sympathized with him, no effort was omitted on her part to cheer the old man by apparent contentment. She did and said every thing that her tender heart could invent to arouse the sufferer from his reveries; but all her efforts were in vain: her father thanked her with a smile and caress; but the smile was sad, the caress constrained and feeble.
If Lenora sometimes asked him, with tears, what was the cause of his depression, he adroitly managed to avoid all explanations. For days together he wandered about the loneliest paths of the garden, apparently anxious to escape the presence even of his daughter. If she caught a glimpse of him at a distance, a fierce look of irritation was perceptible on his face, while his arms were thrown about in rapid and convulsive gesticulations. If she approached him with marks of love and devotion, he scarcely replied to her affectionate words, but left the garden to bury himself in the solitude of the house.
An entire month—a month of bitter sadness and unexpressed suffering on both sides—passed in this way; and Lenora observed with increased anxiety the rapid emaciation and pallor of her father, and the suddenness with which his once-lively eye lost every spark of its wonted vivacity. It was about this time that a slight change in the old gentleman's conduct convinced her that a secret—and perhaps a terrible one—weighed on his heart. Every day or two he went to Antwerp in the calèche, without informing her or any one else of the object of his visit. He came back to Grinselhof late at night, seated himself at the supper-table silent and resigned, and, persuading Lenora to go to bed, soon went off to his own chamber. But his daughter was well aware that he did not retire to rest; for during long hours of wakefulness she heard the floor creak as he paced his apartment with restless steps.