mother, and unappreciated by the public, was wrung by despair.  The exceptional character of the marriage would have surprised a man less heeding of moral peculiarities than was Dorsenne, who had observed, all too frequently, the silence and reserve of that sister not to look upon her as a sacrifice.  He fancied that admiration for his brother-in-law’s genius had blinded Florent to such a degree that he was the first cause of the sacrifice.

“Drama for drama,” said he to himself, as the visit drew near its close, and after a long debate with himself.  “I should prefer to have it one rather than the other in that family.  I should reproach myself all my life for not having tried every means.”  They were in the last room, and Baron Hafner was just fastening the strings of an album of drawings, when the conviction took possession of the young man in a definite manner.  Alba Steno, who still maintained silence, looked at him again with eyes which revealed the struggle of her interest for him and of her wounded pride.  She longed, without doubt, at the moment they were about to separate, to ask him, according to their intimate and charming custom, when they should meet again.  He did not heed her—­any more than he did the other pair of eyes which told him to be more prudent, and which were those of the Baron; any more than he did the observation of Madame Gorka, who, having remarked the ill-humor of Alba, was seeking the cause, which she had long since divined was the heart of the young girl; any more than the attitude of Madame Maitland, whose eyes at times shot fire equal to her brother’s gentleness.  He took the latter by the arm, and said to him aloud: 

“I should like to have your opinion on a small portrait I have noticed in the other room, my dear Chapron.”  Then, when they were before the canvas which had served as a pretext for the aside, he continued, in a low voice:  “I heard very strange news this morning.  Do you know Boleslas Gorka is in Rome unknown to his wife?”

“That is indeed strange,” replied Maitland’s brother-in-law, adding simply, after a silence:  “Are you certain of it?”

“As certain as that we are here,” said Dorsenne.  “One of my friends, Marquis de Montfanon, met him this morning.”

A fresh silence ensued between the two, during which Julien felt that the arm upon which he rested trembled.  Then they joined the party, while Florent said aloud:  “It is an excellent piece of painting, which has, unfortunately, been revarnished too much.”

“May I have done right!” thought Julien.  “He understood me.”

CHAPTER III

BOLESLAS GORKA

Hardly ten minutes had passed since Dorsenne had spoken as he had to Florent Chapron, and already the imprudent novelist began to wonder whether it would not have been wiser not to interfere in any way in an adventure in which his intervention was of the least importance.