Chapter 9 - Page 2

arms folded, lost in
meditation. Here is a fact worthy of remark, which, nevertheless, has
never been remarked: we often subject ourselves to sentiments by our
own volition,--deliberately bind ourselves, and create our own fate;
chance has not as much to do with it as we believe.

"I don't see any horses," said the maid, sitting on a trunk.

"And I don't see any road," said the footman.

"Horses have been here, though," replied the woman, pointing to the
proofs of their presence. "Monsieur," she said, addressing Calyste,
"is this really the way to Guerande?"

"Yes," he replied, "are you expecting some one to meet you?"

"We were told that they would fetch us from Les Touches. If they don't
come," she added to the footman, "I don't know how Madame la marquise
will manage to dress for dinner. You had better go and find
Mademoiselle des Touches. Oh! what a land of savages!"

Calyste had a vague idea of having blundered.

"Is your mistress going to Les Touches?" he inquired.

"She is there; Mademoiselle came for her this morning at seven
o'clock. Ah! here come the horses."

Calyste started toward Guerande with the lightness and agility of a
chamois, doubling like a hare that he might not return upon his tracks
or meet any of the servants of Les Touches. He did, however, meet two
of them on the narrow causeway of the marsh along which he went.

"Shall I go in, or shall I not?" he thought when the pines of Les
Touches came in sight. He was afraid; and continued his way rather
sulkily to Guerande, where he finished his excursion on the mall and
continued his reflections.

"She has no idea of my agitation," he said to himself.

His capricious thoughts were so many grapnels which fastened his heart
to the marquise. He had known none of these mysterious terrors and
joys in his intercourse with Camille. Such vague emotions rise like
poems in the untutored soul. Warmed by the first fires of imagination,
souls like his have been known to pass through all phases of
preparation and to reach in silence and solitude the very heights of
love, without having met the object of so many efforts.

Presently Calyste saw, coming toward him, the Chevalier du Halga and
Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoel, who were walking together on the mall. He
heard them say his name, and he slipped aside out of sight, but not
out of hearing. The chevalier and the old maid, believing themselves
alone, were talking aloud.

"If Charlotte de Kergarouet comes," said the chevalier, "keep her four
or five months. How can you expect her to coquette with Calyste? She