“You promise me that you will not be vexed with me for having undertaken this errand?”

“I promise on one condition.  It is, that not a word which has passed here this morning shall be repeated to any one.  Nobody must suspect the proposal that you have just made to me.”

Cayrol swore to hold his tongue, and he kept his word.  Prince Panine left that same night for England.

Madame Desvarennes was a woman of quick resolution.  She took a sheet of paper, a pen, and in her large handwriting wrote the following lines addressed to Pierre: 

“If you do not wish to find Micheline married on your return, come back without a moment’s delay.”

She sent this ominous letter to the young man, who was then in Tripoli.  That done, she returned to her business as if nothing had happened.  Her placid face did not once betray the anguish of her heart during those three weeks.

The term fixed by Madame Desvarennes with the Prince had expired that morning.  And the severity with which the mistress had received the Minister of War’s Financial Secretary was a symptom of the agitation in which the necessity of coming to a decision placed Micheline’s mother.  Every morning for the last week she had expected Pierre to arrive.  What with having to give an answer to the Prince as she had promised, and the longing to see him whom she loved as a son, she felt sick at heart and utterly cast down.  She thought of asking the Prince for a respite.  It was for that reason she was glad to see Cayrol.

The latter, therefore, had arrived opportunely.  He looked as if he brought startling news.  By a glance he drew Madame Desvarennes’s attention to Marechal and seemed to say: 

“I must be alone with you; send him away.”

The mistress understood, and with a decided gesture said: 

“You can speak before Marechal; he knows all my affairs as well as I do myself.”

“Even the matter that brings me here?” replied Cayrol, with surprise.

“Even that.  It was necessary for me to have some one to whom I could speak, or else my heart would have burst!  Come, do your errand.  The Prince?”

“A lot it has to do with the Prince,” exclaimed Cayrol, in a huff.  “Pierre has arrived!”

Madame Desvarennes rose abruptly.  A rush of blood rose to her face, her eyes brightened, and her lips opened with a smile.

“At last!” she cried.  “But where is he?  How did you hear of his return?”

“Ah! faith, it was just by chance.  I was shooting yesterday at Fontainebleau, and I returned this morning by the express.  On arriving at Paris, I alighted on the platform, and there I found myself face to face with a tall young man with a long beard, who, seeing me pass, called out, ‘Ah, Cayrol!’ It was Pierre.  I only recognized him by his voice.  He is much changed; with his beard, and his complexion bronzed like an African.”

“What did he say to you?”