The gentlemen had left them rather late the night before; but when they went away, they had said: “Until to-morrow.”
“And come earlier than you did to-day!” Agathe had said to Edmond.
He had answered yes, but his voice had not its usual distinctness. One cannot always control one’s voice; that organ almost always betrays the sentiments that agitate us.
Honorine had shown to Paul the letters of Adhémar to Julia Montoni, and Paul had no doubt that, when he should send them to the count’s uncle, the old man would recognize Agathe as his grand-niece.
Meanwhile, Monsieur Duronceray insisted that half of his fortune should constitute the girl’s dowry; then, in an undertone, almost in a whisper, he had offered the other half to Honorine, with the title of his wife.
She had listened to that proposal without uttering a word, but her eyes had answered for her; it seemed to her so sweet to love and to be loved, that she could hardly believe in her happiness.
“Don’t you think,” Agathe asked her friend, “that Edmond seemed very distraught last evening when he bade us good-night?”
“Why, no; I didn’t notice it.”
“Oh! because you didn’t look at anybody but Monsieur Paul.”
“Well! are you displeased because someone loves me?”