“So I have been told; but my conduct to you, sweet one, has not been that of a man from first to last.  Yet I could die for you, with a smile on my lips.  But when I think that once I lifted this sacrilegious hand against your life—­oh!”

“Do not be silly, Camille.  I love you all the better for loving me well enough to kill me.  What woman would not?  I tell you, you foolish thing, you are a man:  monseigneur is one of the lordly sex, that is accustomed to have everything its own way.  My love, in a world that is full of misery, here are two that are condemned to be secretly happy a few months longer:  a hard fate for one of your sex, it seems:  but it is so much sweeter than the usual lot of mine, that really I cannot share your misery,” and she smiled joyously.

“Then share my happiness, my dear wife.”

“I do; only mine is deep, not loud.”

“Why, Dard is gone, and we are out of doors; will the little birds betray us?”

“The lower windows are open, and I saw Jacintha in one of the rooms.”

“Jacintha? we are in awe of the very servants.  Well, if I must not say it loud I will say it often,” and putting his mouth to her ear, he poured a burning whisper of love into it—­“My love! my angel! my wife! my wife! my wife!”

She turned her swimming eyes on him.

“My husband!” she whispered in return.

Rose came out, and found them billing and cooing.  “You must not be so happy, you two,” said she authoritatively.

“How can we help it?” asked Camille.

“You must and shall help it, somehow,” retorted this little tyrant.  “Mamma suspects.  She has given me such a cross-examination, my blood runs cold.  No, on second thoughts, kiss her again, and you may both be as happy as you like; for I am going to tell mamma all, and no power on earth shall hinder me.”

“Rose,” said Camille, “you are a sensible girl; and I always said so.”

But Josephine was horrified.  “What! tell my mother that within a month of my husband’s death?”—­

“Don’t say your husband,” put in Camille wincing; “the priest never confirmed that union; words spoken before a magistrate do not make a marriage in the sight of Heaven.”

Josephine cut him short.  “Amongst honorable men and women all oaths are alike sacred:  and Heaven’s eye is in a magistrate’s room as in a church.  A daughter of Beaurepaire gave her hand to him, and called herself his wife.  Therefore, she was his wife:  and is his widow.  She owes him everything; the house you are all living in among the rest.  She ought to be proud of her brief connection with that pure, heroic spirit, and, when she is so little noble as to disown him, then say that gratitude and justice have no longer a place among mankind.”

“Come into the chapel,” said Camille, with a voice that showed he was hurt.