"What!" said the Count, to whom that idea gave a glimpse of heaven amid the hell around him, "you Countess Monte-Leone!"
"Who then will dare to say that I married a disgraced man?"
"Aminta," said the Count, falling at the feet of the noble-hearted woman, "God knows my gratitude is equal to your love, but I cannot marry you. You know that I love you, that I would give my life for your hand, but my father's name I cannot confer on you, dishonored as it now is. Hear then my oath," said the Count. Aminta trembled, but he said, "I swear by the sacred soul of my father, not to accept your hand until my enemies are confounded, until the infernal imposture of which I am the victim be recognized as the basest and foulest of calumnies."
"So be it," said Aminta. "We will not wait long for that day, and my prayers will appeal to heaven for it. Let Taddeo's life, though, be sacred to you. I confide him to your love of me...." "No,—no," said she, seeing he was about to reply, and perhaps resist her; "do not speak, but remember that Taddeo is my brother, and that his death will separate us for ever."
A few moments after this scene, a carriage, which was standing at the end of the quai, bore the Marquise rapidly to her hotel. We need not say that she was completely overcome by the incidents of the day....
At about ten o'clock the next day, the Duke d'Harcourt, was at the breakfast table with all his family. The eyes of the old man were suddenly struck with the following passage in the Journal des Debats, which he was glancing over. He read it aloud:—
"The terrible secret association, on the track of which the police has very long been, has been discovered—even its name is known—the whimsical one of 'Carbonarism!' We are assured that every rank of life has representatives in this vast affiliation. Even young men of the most noble families of France have been found on its rolls, and they have been already pointed out to the attention of the government."
The Viscount d'Harcourt grew visibly pale as he heard his father read, and Marie called the Duke's attention to the fact. She hurried to his side.
"It is nothing," said he, "but a sudden spasm of pain. It will soon pass away, and in a few minutes I shall be better."
The Duke d'Harcourt had finished his paper, and looked sternly on his son. His glance was like that of the judge on the criminal, a mute appeal to conscience, which the young man could not be insensible of. "René," said the Duke, in his most penetrating tone, "if I did not know that you have overcome the influence of those political chimeras which produced your expulsion from Italy, the agitation caused by what you have heard read would make me think the cause of those conspirators your own." The Count's trouble increased. The old noble continued to speak in this tone, extolling, also, the advantages of a monarchical government, and pointing out the evils likely to result from the possible realization of the plans of the Carbonari. He, however, heard the sounds of many feet in the anteroom of the saloon, where he sat with his children. The secretary of the Duke, the brave D'Arbel, an old officer of the army of Condé, who had emigrated with the Duke, and never left him, appeared at the door. His features expressed the greatest agitation. He said:—