"Never, my incomparable sister; you never did, and never could. Say what you will, ask me what you like; but I fear I am unworthy of your affection, sister."
"You are not unworthy; God gave you as my only brother, you will never be unworthy in my eyes. But it touches me to the quick to suspect others may think lightly of you, Le Gardeur."
He flinched, for his pride was touched, but he knew Amelie was right. "It was weakness in me," said he, "I confess it, sister. To pour wine upon my vexation in hope to cure it, is to feed a fire with oil. To throw fire into a powder magazine were wisdom compared with my folly, Amelie: I was angry at the message I got at such a time. Angelique des Meloises has no mercy upon her lovers!"
"Oh, my prophetic heart! I thought as much! It was Angelique, then, sent you the letter you read at table?"
"Yes, who else could have moved me so? The time was ill-chosen, but I suspect, hating the Bourgeois as she does, Angelique intended to call me from Pierre's fete. I shall obey her now, but tonight she shall obey me, decide to make or mar me, one way or other! You may read the letter, Amelie, if you will."
"I care not to read it, brother; I know Angelique too well not to fear her influence over you. Her craft and boldness were always a terror to her companions. But you will not leave Pierre's fete tonight?" added she, half imploringly; for she felt keenly the discourtesy to Pierre Philibert.
"I must do even that, sister! Were Angelique as faulty as she is fair, I should only love her the more for her faults, and make them my own. Were she to come to me like Herodias with the Baptist's head in a charger, I should outdo Herod in keeping my pledge to her."
Amelie uttered a low, moaning cry. "O my dear infatuated brother, it is not in nature for a De Repentigny to love irrationally like that! What maddening philtre have you drank, to intoxicate you with a woman who uses you so imperiously? But you will not go, Le Gardeur!" added she, clinging to his arm. "You are safe so long as you are with your sister,--you will be safe no longer if you go to the Maison des Meloises tonight!"
"Go I must and shall, Amelie! I have drank the maddening philtre,--I know that, Amelie, and would not take an antidote if I had one!
The world has no antidote to cure me. I have no wish to be cured of love for Angelique, and in fine I cannot be, so let me go and receive the rod for coming to Belmont and the reward for leaving it at her summons!" He affected a tone of levity, but Amelie's ear easily detected the false ring of it.
"Dearest brother!" said she, "are you sure Angelique returns, or is capable of returning, love like yours? She is like the rest of us, weak and fickle, merely human, and not at all the divinity a man in his fancy worships when in love with a woman." It was in vain, however, for Amelie to try to persuade her brother of that.
"What care I, Amelie, so long as Angelique is not weak and fickle to me?" answered he; "but she will think her tardy lover is both weak and fickle unless I put in a speedy appearance at the Maison des Meloises!" He rose up as if to depart, still holding his sister by the hand.
Amelie's tears flowed silently in the darkness. She was not willing to plant a seed of distrust in the bosom of her brother, yet she remembered bitterly and indignantly what Angelique had said of her intentions towards the Intendant. Was she using Le Gardeur as a foil to set off her attractions in the eyes of Bigot?
"Brother!" said Amelie, "I am a woman, and comprehend my sex better than you. I know Angelique's far-reaching ambition and crafty ways.
Are you sure, not in outward persuasion but in inward conviction, that she loves you as a woman should love the man she means to marry?"