As this examination grew more pointed, I searched vainly in my memory for a single token, a single sign, no matter how slight, which might have revealed Raymonde’s heart. There was nothing—not a word, not a look, not a gesture, neither the intimacy of some ride, nor some sudden shyness—there was absolutely nothing to put me on the track. I had settled the question without ever having asked it. And so, after a hesitation which covered me with confusion, I confessed aloud that I knew nothing about it.
For the first time since the commencement of this conversation, M. Mairieux regarded me with sympathy. His clear eyes are almost as limpid as his daughter’s were, and I was surprised at their tenderness. Nevertheless, at the moment, I hated him for the avowals that his cross-examination forced upon me. Was he not casting me down from the pedestal I had mounted? My wealth, by which I thought he would of course be conquered, had been stripped of all its importance in my offer of marriage, and now, uncertain that I had inspired love, I was like those poor lovers whom suspense drives to despair and excess of hope keeps in suspense. But I did not remain there long. Internally I was boiling over, and if I restrained myself on the surface, it was because I thought I should surmount these obstacles without delay.
Mme. Mairieux, to whose remarks her husband had several times responded by requesting her to keep silent, and who had not ceased bestowing upon him evidence of her surprise and disapproval, arose at last to play her part.
“I am going to question her,” she declared.
“No, no, my dear,” protested M. Mairieux.
He attempted to detain her and she grew angry.
“A daughter hides nothing from her mother,” she cried.
I can only guess at what passed between the two women. Raymonde never spoke to me of her mother except with the deepest and the most filial respect. Nevertheless one can divine the conversation from the reply which her mother brought back.
“The child is peculiar,” she said. “I consider her stubborn; she does not want to listen to reason.”
“What is the matter.”