“I shall not be guilty of this fault,” said Major du Trouffle. “If I find slander lying in wait at my door, I will kick it from me and enter my home calmly and smilingly, without having listened to her whispers, or, if I have heard them involuntarily, without believing them.”
“Then there will be at least one house in Berlin where peace will reign,” said Louise, sweetly, “and that house will be ours. I welcome you in the name of our lares, who have been long joyfully awaiting you. I have also an agreeable surprise for you.”
“What surprise, Louise?”
“You often told me that my daughter Camilla disturbed your happiness, that she stood like a dark cloud over my past, which had not belonged to you.”
“It is true! I could not force my heart to love her; her presence reminded me always that you had been loved by another, had belonged to another, and had been made thoroughly wretched.”
“Well then, friend, this cloud has been lifted up, and this is the surprise which awaited your return home. Camilla has been married more than a year.”
“Married’” cried the major, joyfully; “who is the happy man that has undertaken to tame this wilful child, and warm her cold heart?”
“Ask rather, who is the unhappy man who was enamoured with this lovely face, and has taken a demon for an angel?” sighed Louise. “He is a young, distinguished, and wealthy Englishman, Lord Elliot, an attache of the English embassy, who fulfilled the duties of minister during the absence of the ambassador, Lord Mitchel, who was generally at the headquarters of the king.”
“And Camilla, did she love him?”
Louise shrugged her shoulders.