"'Did you ask him for my hand?'
"'Yes, mademoiselle.'
"'What answer did he make?'
"Gabriel began to twirl his cane.
"'If you don't keep your cane quiet, monsieur, I'll throw it out of the window! What did father say?'
"'Mademoiselle—monsieur your father—he is not in a very good humor—he listened to me with a sarcastic expression, and then—then he took me by the hand, and—and put me out of his study. "Go and blow your nose!" he said; "you may come again in ten years and talk about your love."'
"'What! is it possible? My father told you to—to go and blow your nose?'
"'Yes, mademoiselle; and I give you my word I had no desire to.'
"I was petrified. My father's response seemed to me so rude, so humiliating, to Gabriel, that I asked him, looking him in the eye:
"'And you took that without a word?'