likely to afford me delightful company; yet I expect, in all probability, to quit the convent at any moment.”
“How, you are going soon?” asked Milady.
“At least I hope so,” said the novice, with an expression of joy which she made no effort to disguise.
“I think I learned you had suffered persecutions from the cardinal,” continued Milady; “that would have been another motive for sympathy between us.”
“What I have heard, then, from our good mother is true; you have likewise been a victim of that wicked priest.”
“Hush!” said Milady; “let us not, even here, speak thus of him. All my misfortunes arise from my having said nearly what you have said before a woman whom I thought my friend, and who betrayed me. Are you also the victim of a treachery?”
“No,” said the novice, “but of my devotion—of a devotion to a woman I loved, for whom I would have laid down my life, for whom I would give it still.”
“And who has abandoned you—is that it?”
“I have been sufficiently unjust to believe so; but during the last two or three days I have obtained proof to the contrary, for which I thank God—for it would have cost me very dear to think she had forgotten me. But you, Madame, you appear to be free,” continued the novice; “and if you were inclined to fly it only rests with yourself to do so.”
“Whither would you have me go, without friends, without money, in a part of France with which I am unacquainted, and where I have never been before?”