She sat motionless, her lips tightly closed, her features rigid, but the nervous twitching of her fingers as she bent the green stem back and forth, betrayed her inward agitation.

“No; I can not tell,” she replied at last, in an almost inaudible voice.

“Truly?” he exclaimed, with an expression of astonishment, in which was a certain amount of secret satisfaction; “you can not tell whom I mean?  You have never thought of the person of whom I am speaking in that light?”

“No; who is that person?”

She had raised her eyes toward his, and they shone with a deep, mysterious light.

“It is Claudet Sejournant,” replied Julien, very gently; and in an altered tone.

The glow that had illumined the dark orbs of the young girl faded away, her eyelids dropped, and her countenance became as rigid as before; but Julien did not notice anything.  The words he had just uttered had cost him too much agony, and he dared not look at his companion, lest he should behold her joyful surprise, and thereby aggravate his suffering.

“Ah!” said Reine, coldly, “in that case, why did not Claudet come himself and state his own case?”

“His courage failed him at the last moment—­and so—­”

“And so,” continued she, with sarcastic bitterness of tone, “you took upon yourself to speak for him?”

“Yes; I promised him I would plead his cause.  I was sure, moreover, that I should not have much difficulty in gaining the suit.  Claudet has loved you for a long time.  He is good-hearted, and a fine fellow to look at.  And as to worldly advantages, his position is now equal to your own.  I have made over to him, by legal contract, the half of his father’s estate.  What answer am I to take back?”

He spoke with difficulty in broken sentences, without turning his eyes toward Mademoiselle Vincart.  The silence that followed his last question seemed to him unbearable, and the contrasting chirping of the noisy grasshoppers, and the buzzing of the flies in the quiet sunny garden, resounded unpleasantly in his ears.

Reine remained speechless.  She was disconcerted and well-nigh overpowered by the unexpected announcement, and her brain seemed unable to bear the crowd of tumultuous and conflicting emotions which presented themselves.  Certainly, she had already suspected that Claudet had a secret liking for her, but she never had thought of encouraging the feeling.  The avowal of his hopes neither surprised nor hurt her; that which pained her was the intervention of Julien, who had taken in hand the cause of his relative.  Was it possible that this same M. de Buxieres, who had made so audacious a display of his tender feeling in the hut, could now come forward as Claudet’s advocate, as if it were the most natural thing in the world for him to do?  In that case, his astonishing behavior at the fete, which had caused her so much pain, and which she had endeavored to excuse in her own mind as the