“No, never in my whole life have I met a woman who can compare with this Marie-Anne! What grace and what dignity! Ah! her beauty is divine!”

So Martial was thinking while returning to Sairmeuse after his proposals to M. Lacheneur.

At the risk of losing his way he took the shortest course, which led across the fields and over ditches, which he leaped with the aid of his gun.

He found a pleasure, entirely novel and very delightful, in picturing Marie-Anne as he had just seen her, blushing and paling, about to swoon, then lifting her head haughtily in her pride and disdain.

Who would have suspected that such indomitable energy and such an impassioned soul was hidden beneath such girlish artlessness and apparent coldness? What an adorable expression illumined her face, what passion shone in those great black eyes when she looked at that little fool d’Escorval! What would not one give to be regarded thus, even for a moment? How could the boy help being crazy about her?

He himself loved her, without being, as yet, willing, to confess it. What other name could be given to this passion which had overpowered reason, and to the furious desires which agitated him?

“Ah!” he exclaimed, “she shall be mine. Yes, she shall be mine; I will have her!”

Consequently he began to study the strategic side of the undertaking which this resolution involved with the sagacity of one who had not been without an extended experience in such matters.

His debut, he was forced to admit, had been neither fortunate nor adroit. Conveyed compliments and money had both been rejected. If Marie-Anne had heard his covert insinuations with evident horror, M. Lacheneur had received, with even more than coldness, his advances and his offers of actual wealth.

Moreover, he remembered Chanlouineau’s terrible eyes.

“How he measured me, that magnificent rustic!” he growled. “At a sign from Marie-Anne he would have crushed me like an eggshell, without a thought of my ancestors. Ah! does he also love her? There will be three rivals in that case.”

But the more difficult and even perilous the undertaking seemed, the more his passions were inflamed.

“My failures can be repaired,” he thought. “Occasions of meeting shall not be wanting. Will it not be necessary to hold frequent interviews with Monsieur Lacheneur in effecting a formal transfer of Sairmeuse? I will win him over to my side. With the daughter my course is plain. Profiting by my unfortunate experience, I will, in the future, be as timid as I have been bold; and she will be hard to please if she is not flattered by this triumph of her beauty. D’Escorval remains to be disposed of ——”

But this was the point upon which Martial was most exercised.

He had, it is true, seen this rival rudely dismissed by M. Lacheneur; and yet the anger of the latter had seemed to him too great to be absolutely real.

He suspected a comedy, but for whose benefit? For his, or for Chanlouineau’s? And yet, what could possibly be the motive?

“And yet,” he reflected, “my hands are tied; and I cannot call this little d’Escorval to account for his insolence. To swallow such an affront in silence is hard. Still, he is brave, there is no denying that; perhaps I can find some other way to provoke his anger. But even then, what could I do? If I harmed a hair of his head, Marie-Anne would never forgive me. Ah! I would give a handsome sum in exchange for some little device to send him out of the country.”

Revolving in his mind these plans, whose frightful consequences he could neither calculate nor foresee, Martial was walking up the avenue leading to the chateau, when he heard hurried footsteps behind him.

He turned, and seeing two men running after him and motioning him to stop, he paused.

It was Chupin, accompanied by one of his sons.

This old rascal had been enrolled among the servants charged with preparing Sairmeuse for the reception of the duke; and he had already discovered the secret of making himself useful to his master, which was by seeming to be indispensable.

“Ah, Monsieur,” he cried, “we have been searching for you everywhere, my son and I. It was Monsieur le Duc ——”

“Very well,” said Martial, dryly. “I am returning ——”

But Chupin was not sensitive; and although he had not been very favorably received, he ventured to follow the marquis at a little distance, but sufficiently near to make himself heard. He also had his schemes; for it was not long before he began a long recital of the calumnies which had been spread about the neighborhood in regard to the Lac............