It was at the same time the greatest wickedness and the perpetual danger of his life, but it was also the excitement, the pride, and the magnificent voluptuousness of it. He shuddered. The idea of losing the love which had cost him so dear exasperated him. He cast a burning glance on this beautiful face, refined and exalted as that of a warring archangel.
"My life is yours," he said. "How could you have dreamed of breaking ties like ours? How could you have alarmed yourself, or even thought of my feelings toward another? I do what honor and humanity command me— nothing more. As for you—I love you—understand that."
"Is it true?" she asked. "It is true! I believe you!"
She took his hand, and gazed at him a moment without speaking—her eye dimmed, her bosom palpitating; then suddenly rising, she said, "My friend, you know I have guests!" and saluting him with a smile, left the boudoir.
This scene, however, left a disagreeable impression on the mind of Camors. He thought of it impatiently the next morning, while trying a horse on the Champs Elysees—when he suddenly found himself face to face with his former secretary, Vautrot. He had never seen this person since the day he had thought proper to give himself his own dismissal.
The Champs Elysees was deserted at this hour. Vautrot could not avoid, as he had probably done more than once, encountering Camors.
Seeing himself recognized he saluted him and stopped, with an uneasy smile on his lips. His worn black coat and doubtful linen showed a poverty unacknowledged but profound. M. de Camors did not notice these details, or his natural generosity would have awakened, and curbed the sudden indignation that took possession of him.
He reined in his horse sharply.
"Ah, is it you, Monsieur Vautrot?" he said. "You have left England then! What are you doing now?"
"I am looking for a situation, Monsieur de Camors," said Vautrot, humbly, who knew his old patron too well not to read clearly in the curl of his moustache the warning of a storm.