"Yes."
Keen annoyance changed the expression of Lucienne's face; it grew hard.
"Although we do not agree with each other very well, surely you are not capable of trying to turn my betrothed against me?"
Tears appeared in the corners of Madame Oberlé's eyelids.
"Oh Lucienne!"
"No, I do not believe it. It is something important?"
"Yes."
"Does it concern me?"
"No; not you."
The young girl opened her mouth to continue, then listened, became a little pale, and turned completely towards the door, while her mother turned only half-round in the same direction. Some one was coming upstairs. Wilhelm von Farnow, preceded by the caretaker, who accompanied him only as far as the landing, saw Madame Oberlé through the opening of the door, and as if on a military parade, he drew himself up and crossed the room quickly, and bowed his haughty head first to the mother, then to the young girl.