Jacqueline -- Volume 3

een her in his boyhood knitting in the same way with the same, look on her face, when he had been thrown from his pony, or had fallen from his velocipede. He himself looked ill at ease and worried,

e felt himself, with some impatience, at the mercy of the most tender, but the most sharp-eyed of nurses, a prisoner to her devotion, and made conscious of her power every moment. Her attentions worried him; he knew that they all meant "It is your own fault, my poor boy, that you are in this state, and that your mother is so un

to Madame d'Argy that Madame

he said, rolling

suddenl

sk her to

fatal influence of Jacqueline, alarmed by the increasing intimacy with Giselle, desirous that all such complications shou

er after her son; but she settled herself in her chair with an air m

nguerrand, were: "How pretty you are! It is charity," he added, smiling, "to pres

poor mother had resumed her knitting with a sigh, hardly glancing at

Oscar fell in love with it at a first representation of a vaudeville, and he gave me over into the hands

o fast that its throbs could be seen under the embroidered front of the bodice which fitted her

myself in my best to-day

tortoise-shell knit

d, coldly, "I am glad anybody can be hap

king at her, as if by some instinct he und

sfaction, very artificial, however, for she could hardly breathe, so gre

an your husband?" said M

o, I speak of a prodigal who did not go far, and who

ing-needles ticked rapidly, a slight

the fatted calf in her honor. The comings and going of Mademoiselle

te; he has just proved it, I

much embarrassed as Giselle. S

er in everybody's mouth

ark: it seems to me you show a want of tact such

on her, that he was, on that point, of his mother's opi

ious about you ever since I heard

aper but the Gazette de France, or occasionally the Debats, knew

eu'! I thoug

of honor apologizing for having spoken lightly, for having repeated false rumors without verifying them-in short, retracting all that he had said that reflected in

rl's character," said Madame d'Argy, sententiously, "in

iselle. "The self-constituted champion

y errand unnecessary. I had thought of a way to end this sad affair; a very simple way, much better, most certainly, than men cutting their own

up from his couch so quickly that he jarred his bandaged arm, and

feet, watching, as she did so, Madame d'Argy's profile, which was reflec

" he said, hesitatin

lles has not just a

and that, though she passed through Monaco, she did not stay there- twen

his own eyes, and which is confirmed by public rumor?"

may feel sure that to make it as flattering to her tomorrow as it is otherwise to-day only a marriage is n

ho had compromised herself?" s

e his part to c

opose it to Mon

onsieur de Cymie

. "Indeed, Giselle, you are losing your sen

east, in which his mother had wrapped him; and this unsuitable garment formed such a queer contrast to the expression of his face tha

rself. "You hear me-never wil

r was partly opened, a

r l'Abbe

gesture which was any

ce! What does he want! Does he wish me to assist in some

of receiving his visit. Go and see him yourself. Giselle will t

tly was not angry at what she had dared to say, and

," said Madame d'Argy, with a smile that

ever, because

see the Ab

ed got up from his sofa and approach

said he. "Is it you-really you w

t. Now keep still. Your mother is furiously displeased with me-I am sorry-but she will get over it. I know that in Jacqueline you would have a good wife- a wife far better than the Jacqueline you w

frankly and hide nothing. Your eyes never told anything but the truth.

ve, and which with a great effort she prevented from trembling. Then her nerves gave way under his long and

perfectly sensible act, to which you are strongly inclined -don't tell me you are not-whether, in short, you marry Jacqueline, I shall be really as glad of

her perfections. I laughed, yes, I laughed to myself, and I was careful how I contradicted you. I tried to keep you safe for her, to prevent your going elsewhere and forming attachments which might have resulted in your forgetting her. I did m

"but as to the slightest feeling of love between us, love the most spiritual, the most platonic- yes, all men, I fan

aying, when he could recollect what seemed to him so many proofs to the contrary. Yet in what she said there was no hesitation

t last, not knowing what

vere

a smile, gracious, yet

do. But he

w love only you-all the more at this moment when I see you love me more than yourself." But, instead, he murmured only, like a man. and a lover: "And Jacqu

t last sleep in which all our faculties, weakened and exhausted, fail us; it is the blow which annihilates our supreme illusion and leaves us disabused in a col

ic as she was, to have any courage lef

w voice: "That is a quest

ame d'Argy vehemently repeating: "Never! No, I

r that, unmarried, her son would return to Tonquin, that Lizerolles would be left deserted, her house would be desolate wi

ir happiness: I will a

ing never, but less and less emphatically, and apparently she ceased to say it at last, for three months la

honor to inform you of

alier of the Legion of H

lle

anying car

you of the marriage of Mademoiselle Jacqueline de

and every one seemed to take a sincere part in the joy that was expressed on the occasion, even Dolly, who, it was said, had in secret set her heart on Fred for herself; even Nora Sparks, who,

if to welcome the young pair. Modeste sang 'Nunc Dimittis'. The le

ITOR'S B

lay aside harsh judg

ihilates our s

not that

no cure for t

and is always