"Go down and get your dinner. I will ring for you when I want you."

The nurse left the room, and Suzanne seated herself in the chair the woman had just vacated.

On hearing his aunt's voice, Onesime looked greatly relieved; and when he saw her seat herself near him, he exclaimed:

"So you have come at last! How glad I am!"

"I heard you sigh just now, my dear boy, so you must still be suffering just as much or more, I fear."

"No; I feel much better."

"You are not saying that merely to rea.s.sure me, I hope."

"Take hold of my hand. You know how hot it was awhile ago."

"Yes, it is much cooler now, I see. And your wound, does it still trouble you much?"

"I have a little difficulty in breathing, that is all. The wound itself doesn't amount to much."

"Good Heavens! so a wound in the breast from a dagger is nothing, is it?"

"My dear aunt--"

"What do you want?"

"How is Mlle. Sabine?"

"Everybody is well, very well, as I've told you before."

"And M. Cloarek?"

"There is no use in asking me so many questions. I sha'n't answer them.

By and by, when you are really better, it will be different."

"Listen, aunt. You refuse to answer me for fear of agitating me too much, but I swear to you that the uncertainty I am in concerning Mlle.

Sabine and M. Cloarek makes me miserable."

"Everybody is getting on very well, I tell you."

"No, aunt, no, that is impossible, after the terrible and still inexplicable occurrence that--"

"But, my dear nephew, I a.s.sure you--Come, come, don't be so impatient.

Can't you be a little more reasonable? Calm yourself, Onesime, I beg of you!"

"Is it my fault? Why will you persist in keeping me in such a state of suspense?"

"Don't I keep telling you that everybody is well?"

"But I tell you that is impossible," exclaimed the young man, excitedly.

"What! do you mean to tell me that Mlle. Sabine, who starts and trembles at the slightest sound, could see her home invaded by a furious band of armed men, without sustaining a terrible, perhaps fatal, shock?"

"But, Onesime, listen to me--"

"Who knows but she may be dead, dead, and you are concealing it from me?

You think you are acting for the best, aunt, but you are mistaken. The truth, no matter how terrible it may be, will do me much less harm than this state of frightful uncertainty. Sleeping and waking, I am a prey to the most terrible fears. I would a hundred times rather be dead than live in this state of suspense."

"Listen, then, but promise to be reasonable and have courage."

"Courage? Ah, I knew that some terrible calamity had occurred."

"Dear me! I knew it would be just this way whatever I said or did!"

cried poor Suzanne. "You see yourself that at the very first word I say to you--"

"Oh, my G.o.d! I had a presentiment of it. She is dead!"

"No, no, she is living, she is living. I swear it! She has suffered terribly,--she has been alarmingly ill, but her life is no longer in danger."

"It has been in danger, then?"

"Yes, for two days, but I have just seen her and talked with her, and there is no longer cause for the slightest anxiety."

"G.o.d be thanked!" exclaimed Onesime, fervently. "And how much I thank you, too, my dear aunt. Ah, if you knew how much good you have done me, and how relieved I feel. Is M. Cloarek here?"

"No."

"Where is he?"

"We do not know."

"But that fatal night--"

"He came home, and was slightly wounded in the fray, but no one has seen him since."

"And that strange attack upon the house, those frightful but incomprehensible words which were uttered by Mlle. Sabine, and which I seemed to hear as in a dream after I was hurt. These things puzzle me so. Explain them, I beg of you."

"In your present state of mind I can see that a refusal on my part might prove dangerous."

"Yes, very dangerous."

"But I repeat that you must have courage, for--"

"I will, aunt, I will."

"You remember, do you not, that on the afternoon of that memorable day, M. Cloarek, who had left for Havre without our knowing it, sent a message to his daughter from that city telling her that she must not be anxious about him, as some business matters might detain him until late that night? You recollect that, do you not?"

"Yes."

"You remember, too, the fright we had the very evening of M. Cloarek's arrival?"