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"No,
Calyste; forget what you have heard; I count for nothing in all this."
She rose and stood erect before the two men, subduing both with the
lightning of her eyes, from which her soul shone out.
"While Claude was speaking," she said, "I conceived the beauty and the
grandeur of love without hope; it is the sentiment that brings us
nearest God. Do not love me, Calyste; but I will love you as no woman
will!"
It was the cry of a wounded eagle seeking its eyrie. Claude himself
knelt down, took Camille's hand, and kissed it.
"Leave us now, Calyste," she said, "it is late, and your mother will
be uneasy."
Calyste returned to Guerande with lagging steps, turning again and
again, to see the light from the windows of the room in which was
Beatrix. He was surprised himself to find how little pity he felt for
Camille. But presently he felt once more the agitations of that scene,
the tears she had left upon his hair; he suffered with her suffering;
he fancied he heard the moans of that noble woman, so beloved, so
desired but a few short days before.


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