More at his ease, the young man could display the seductive qualities of his heart until now discreetly hidden, the expansive gaiety of his age, the simplicity which comes of a life of study, the treasures of a delicate mind that life has not adulterated, the innocent joyousness which goes so well with loving youth.

His soul and Marguerite's understood each other better; they went together to the depths of their hearts and found in each the same thoughts,--pearls of equal lustre, sweet fresh harmonies like those the legends tell of beneath the waves, which fascinate the divers.

They made themselves known to one another by an interchange of thought, a reciprocal introspection which bore the signs, in both, of exquisite sensibility.

It was done without false shame, but not without mutual coquetry.

The two hours which Emmanuel spent with the sisters and old Martha enabled Marguerite to accept the life of anguish and renunciation on which she had entered.