The man invited him to enter, and showed him into an anteroom off the hall.
Presently he heard a step upon the staircase, that sent a thrill right through him and made the heart within him dance with joy. For the moment, all the past was blotted out; all his shame, his rage, his desire to be revenged upon Napoleon, were as though they had never been; he lived only in the present.
He had been warming his hands before the fire, but, at the opening of the door, he swung round and faced her.
She advanced into the room with a quick, gliding motion, a look of eager expectation on her face. Then, bending courteously, she said, "I bid you welcome, Sir. I understand you are direct from France, and are the bearer of important news. Does it by any chance concern—Vincennes? I am deeply interested in one—"
All the while she had fixed her eyes piercingly, inquiringly upon St. Just, scrutinizing him from head to foot. Suddenly they glowed with a brighter light, and a flash of joyous recognition was darted from their depths.
"Henri!" she cried, nay, almost shrieked; and she rushed to him and threw her arms around his neck. She drew his head down to her own and covered him with kisses. "Oh! my darling, to think that you are given back to me once more. And I had mourned you so, and had tried, oh my very hardest, for your release; and the terror I have been in lest—but there, I cannot put it into words. But it is over, and you have come back to me, my dearest. Oh! my happiness is too great."
She burst out laughing; then she began to sob hysterically, and the tears fell from her eyes in scalding drops.
St. Just laid his hand gently on her gold brown locks and stroked them fondly. "Don't weep, my own," he said; "this is no time for tears; tears are for sorrow, not for joy; and we are happy now. Ah, chérie, you don't know what it is for me to be with you again, after all that I have suffered, it is like heaven, but I will spare you the recital of what I have undergone. Our hours shall not be so misspent, and we have lost too many since first we met. So, dry your tears, my sweet, and let me see you smile."
She looked up at him, smiling lovingly through the drops that glistened, like liquid diamonds, on her cheeks. "It is joy, my Henri," she murmured sobbingly. "It has been too much for me to see you so unexpectedly; but I shall be myself again directly." Then she stroked his face again.
It was two hours later and the reunited couple were still seated together in Halima's boudoir, whither she had taken him. Of course she had coaxed out of him a full account of all that he had seen and done and suffered since their last meeting. At his relation of the Duc d'Enghien's murder, the tears rushed to her eyes; but her grief was only momentary, for it was overwhelmed in the swirl of indignation that swept over her. She sprang to her feet and began to pace rapidly about the room; the blood rushed in a torrent to her face, and there was a dangerous glitter in her eyes.