"How, monsieur?" she faltered, trembling under two fears, that of Montignac's ardor and that of my disclosing myself. "I am puzzled to know."
"By conferring your hand, mademoiselle," said Montignac, following her and grasping her wrist. "Your father will be glad to give his consent for his liberty, if he knows that you have given yours. But we can arrange to proceed without his consent. Do not draw back, mademoiselle. It is marriage that I offer, when I might make other terms. My family is a good one; my prospects are the best, and I have to lay at your feet a love that has never been offered to another, a love as deep as it is fresh—"
I clutched the curtain to give vent to my rage. Mademoiselle was looking towards me, and saw the curtain move.
"Say no more!" she cried, fearful lest his continuance might be too much for my restraint. "I cannot hear you?"
"I love you, mademoiselle," he went on, losing his self-control, so that his face quivered with passion. "I can save you and your father!"
He thrust his face so close to hers that she drew back with an expression of disgust.
"A fine love, indeed?" she cried, scornfully, "that would buy the love it dare not hope to elicit free!" And she turned to La Chatre as if for protection. But the governor shook his head, and remained motionless at the window.
"A love you shall not despise, mademoiselle!" hissed Montignac, stung by her scorn. He was standing by the table near the bed, and, in his anger, he made to strike the table with his dagger, but he struck instead the tray on the table, and so produced a loud, ringing sound that startled the ear.
"Your fate is in my hands," he went on; "so is your father's. As for this Tournoire, concerning whom you have suddenly become scrupulous, he is, doubtless, by this time in the hands of the troops who have gone for him, and very well it is that we decided not to wait for you to lead him to us. So he had best be dismissed from your mind, as he presently will be from this life. Accept me, and your father goes free! Spurn me, and he dies in the château of Fleurier, and you shall still belong to me! Why not give me what I have the power and the intention to take?"
"If you take it," cried mademoiselle, "that is your act. Were I to give, that would be mine. It is by our own acts that we stand or fall in our own eyes and God's!" She spoke loudly, in a resolute voice, as if to show me that she could look to herself, so that I need not come out to her defence,—for well she guessed my mind, and knew that, though she had consented a thousand times to betray me, I would not stand passive while a man pressed his unwelcome love on her. And now, as if to force a change of theme by sheer vehemence of manner, she turned her back towards Montignac and addressed La Chatre with a fire that she had not previously shown.