"But where is your rose?" said the young man, still scarcely able to speak with surprise.
"It is gone—cut away with a knife!" replied she thoughtfully; "but never mind; let us look for mamma."
Edouard took her arm, and in a few minutes the whole family were united. The young man drew his uncle away from a card-table, saying that Geraldine wished to go home. After handing his aunt and cousin to their carriage, he got in after them, quite an unusual thing for him.
"Why, Edouard, you are going out of your way," said the father.
"I know it. But I can not wait until to-morrow. M. Delisle, will you give me your daughter's hand? Geraldine has given her consent."
"My dear girl," exclaimed her mother, "why did you not tell us this before? You would have saved us so much pain, and your other suitors the humiliation of being rejected."
"I did not make up my mind until this evening," replied Geraldine. "I do not think I should have accepted him to-morrow. But he was cunning enough to come and propose before I had time for reflection."
"You will then authorize me to accept him?" said M. Delisle.
"I have accepted him, papa," replied Geraldine.
That evening Edouard entered the house with them, and sat talking for some time. When he went away, he had succeeded in having the wedding fixed for that day-month. Geraldine looked pale the next day; and when her mamma noticed it, said that she should go to no more parties, as she wished to look well the day she was married, and expressed a wish to go on excursions into the country instead. Mme Delisle freely acquiesced, Edouard came to dinner, looking much pleased, but still under the influence of the astonishment which had not yet been effaced from his plump and rosy face.