"I will say so, monsieur. Be pleased to enter."
CHAPTER XXXV.
AT LAST.
It seemed almost as if he had been expected from his appearance being received in so matter-of-fact a way. Yet, he reflected, why should it be otherwise? Aurélie de Roquemaure could scarce know of all that had happened to him of late—above all could not be aware that he had become possessed of the information that she was the kidnapper of Dorine.
He had, however, but little time for reflection since Boussac was by his side, and, when they dismounted from their horses, had followed him into the large sombre hall to which the old servant had led the way. Yet, when the man had gone to seek his mistress, the latter took one more opportunity to plead that he should be gentle with her.
"Remember," he said, "remember, I beseech you, that you have but her brother's word for what you suspect her of; he was a villain, he might have lied in his last moments for some reason—perhaps did not even think those last moments were in truth at hand; might have hoped to escape after all and profit by the lie. Remember! Oh, remember!"
"I will remember," St. Georges said. Then, with one glance at Boussac, he added, "But the villain did not lie then!"
The domestic came back, and St. Georges learned that the hour for his explanation, long sought and meditated upon, was at hand. "His mistress would see monsieur," he said. He would conduct him to her.
In the same room where he had first set eyes on Aurélie de Roquemaure he saw her again—the old man ushering him in and then swiftly leaving the room. They were face to face at last! As it had been before, so it was now—her beauty as she rose on his entrance was strikingly apparent, compelled regard. And the four years that had passed since that first meeting had done much to increase, to ripen that beauty; instead of the budding girl it was a stately woman who now met his eyes. And the contrast between them was great, was all to her advantage so far as exterior matters were concerned: he travel-stained, worn, and with now in his long hair some streaks of gray; she fresh and beautiful in the long black lace dress she wore, a rose in her bosom, her hair undisguised by any wig and swept back into a huge knot behind. "How beautiful she is!" he thought, as he gave her one glance, "yet how base and contemptible!"