if possible, from the impressions of the spot where she had suffered so
severely from the presence of her husband, and from the unfortunate
embarrassment of their situation. She desired also to meditate in
solitude, in order to decide what course to take under such unexampled
circumstances. Finally, she had not the courage to see M. de Camors
again--if she ever could see him again--until some time had elapsed.
It was not without anxiety that she awaited the reply of the Count to the
request she had addressed him.

In the midst of the troubled confusion of her ideas, she believed him
capable of almost anything; and she feared everything from him. The
Count's note reassured her. She hastened to read it to her daughter;
and both of them, like two poor lost creatures who cling to the smallest
twig, remarked with pleasure the tone of respectful abandonment with
which he had reposed their destinies in their own hands. He spent his
whole day at the session of the Corps Legislatif; and when he returned,
they had departed.

Madame de Camors woke up the next morning in the chamber where her
girlhood had passed. The birds of spring were singing under her windows
in the old ancestral gardens. As she recognized these friendly voices,
so familiar to her infancy, her heart melted; but several hours' sleep
had restored to her her natural courage. She banished the thoughts which
had weakened her, rose, and went to surprise her mother at her first
waking. Soon after, both of them were walking together on the terrace of
lime-trees. It was near the end of April; the young, scented verdure
spread itself out beneath the sunbeams; buzzing flies already swarmed in
the half-opened roses, in the blue pyramids of lilacs, and in the
clusters of pink clover. After a few turns made in silence in the midst
of this fresh and enchanting scene, the young Countess, seeing her mother