"Monsieur," she replied, "to any other man I should answer that
question only by a look; but to you, and because you are indeed almost
the father of Monsieur de Camps, I reply by asking what you would
think of a woman if to such a question she answered _you_? To avow our
love for him we love, when he loves us--ah! that may be; but even when
we are certain of being loved forever, believe me, monsieur, it is an
effort for us, and a reward to him. To say to another!--"

She did not end her sentence, but rose, bowed to the old man, and
withdrew into her private apartments, the doors of which, opening and
closing behind her, had a language of their own to his sagacious ears.

"Ah! the mischief!" thought he; "what a woman! she is either a sly one
or an angel"; and he got into his hired coach, the horses of which
were stamping on the pavement of the silent courtyard, while the
coachman was asleep on his box after cursing for the hundredth time
his tardy customer.

The next morning about eight o'clock the old gentleman mounted the
stairs of a house in the rue de l'Observance where Octave de Camps was
living. If there was ever an astonished man it was the young professor
when he beheld his uncle. The door was unlocked, his lamp still
burning; he had been sitting up all night.

"You rascal!" said Monsieur de Bourbonne, sitting down in the nearest
chair; "since when is it the fashion to laugh at uncles who have
twenty-six thousand francs a year from solid acres to which we are the
sole heir? Let me tell you that in the olden time we stood in awe of
such uncles as that. Come, speak up, what fault have you to find with