Ashamed of having resisted the
promptings of his heart for a whole week, and feeling himself
almost a criminal in this mental struggle, he called the same
evening on Madame de Rouville.
All his suspicions, all his evil thoughts vanished at the sight
of the young girl, who had grown pale and thin.
"Good heavens! what is the matter?" he asked her, after greeting
the Baroness.
Adelaide made no reply, but she gave him a look of deep
melancholy, a sad, dejected look, which pained him.
"You have, no doubt, been working hard," said the old lady. "You
are altered. We are the cause of your seclusion. That portrait
had delayed some pictures essential to your reputation."
Hippolyte was glad to find so good an excuse for his rudeness.
"Yes," he said, "I have been very busy, but I have been
suffering----"
At these words Adelaide raised her head, looked at her lover, and
her anxious eyes had now no hint of reproach.
"You must have thought us quite indifferent to any good or ill
that may befall you?" said the old lady.
"I was wrong," he replied. "Still, there are forms of pain which
we know not how to confide to any one, even to a friendship of
older date than that with which you honor me."
"The sincerity and strength of friendship are not to be measured
by time. I have seen old friends who had not a tear to bestow on
misfortune," said the Baroness, nodding sadly.
"But you--what ails you?" the young man asked Adelaide.
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